140 DORSET CLOTHES-MOTHS AND THEIR HABITS. 



a very short time, usually from ten minutes to half-an-hour, to 

 their full size and soon become stiff so as to render the insect 

 capable of flight. 



Anyone who has watched clothes-moths and tried to catch them 

 on a piece of fur or other article will have noticed that they have 

 great powers of running, and trust much more to their legs than 

 their wings to escape capture. They, especially those belonging to 

 the genus Tinea, of Stainton (this genus is much split up by some 

 authors), have very long and powerful hind legs, which one might 

 almost fancy them using for jumping like a grasshopper, but I have 

 never observed this mode of progression. They run, however, at 

 a great pace over and through the wool, fur, &c., and have 

 altogether a very slippery appearance and movement. I do not think 

 I have ever seen this more strikingly exemplified than in the case of 

 Tinea pallescentella, of which I found a few under the old wooden 

 Ferry Bridge leading to Portland, the larvae having perhaps fed on 

 fish remains from the baskets in which fish were carried, which 

 the fishermen kept there. The moth sat on the wood very quietly 

 until you tried to catch it, but directly you got close it rushed 

 away round a corner or down a crack or under a stone, and was 

 most difficult to secure. I do not remember that I ever saw one 

 fly, though I have been there at various periods of the night and 

 early morning in the daytime they did not appear at all. 



I have already alluded to the wonderful statements which I 

 sometimes hear on the subject of clothes-moths. I am sorry to say 

 that there are people who are under the impression that all moths 

 eat clothes, and who would (if they were not frightened of it) 

 destroy a large hawk moth if they found it in their house, thinking 

 that it had come to make a wholesale raid on their carpets. Others, 

 more moderately, assign the damage to all the smaller moths indis- 

 criminately. There is, however, even amongst entomologists a 

 good deal of difference of opinion as to what moths should properly 

 be included in the term clothes-moths, so that I think it best to 

 take in order all that have or are supposed to have any claim to 

 be so called, giving a short account of the habits of each. 



