MIMICRY 229 



Longicorns of the sub-family to which Xyaste belongs 

 have the antennae long and slender. The effect of a 

 short flattened antenna is produced in a very inter- 

 esting way : the first few basal joints are clothed 

 thickly with long black hairs closely set together, 

 whilst all the rest of the antenna is drawn out into a 

 fine slender thread which is hardly visible ; in fact at 

 a short distance it is quite invisible, and the antennae 

 appear to be exactly like those of the model. 



Examples of caterpillars resembling snakes have 

 been described more than once, but most of these 

 have resembled some weird monster rather than any 

 given species of snake. But in Sarawak I met with a 

 caterpillar which really did deceive me for the 

 moment : it is the caterpillar of a Hawk-Moth, Chcero- 

 campa mydon; the greater part of the body was hidden 

 behind a Caladium leaf on which the caterpillar was 

 feeding. The general colour was dark olive-brown, 

 becoming paler anteriorly ; at the junction of the third 

 and fourth segments on each side was an ocellus very 

 nearly the exact size of the eye of such a snake as 

 Dendrophis pictus ; the lower border of this ocellus was 

 margined with bright gold (the colour of the iris in 

 many snakes), giving an upward glance to the "eye." 

 The black of the ocellus was so intense and glossy 

 that an idea of depth was given, and it was difficult 

 to believe that one was not looking through a real 

 cornea into a real pupil. Running through the ocellus 

 on each side was a broad black stripe, just as in 

 D. pictus, while a wrinkled fold on each side of the 

 lower half of segments 2-4 gave an admirable im- 

 pression of the division between the upper and lower 

 jaws of a snake. Not the least remarkable of these 



