LEPJDOPTERA. 443 



Their caterpillars have sixteen feet, and their body is closely shorn or but 

 slightly pilose. They twist and roll up leaves of trees, connecting various 

 points of their surface at different times by layers of silken threads running in 

 one direction, and thus form a tube in which they reside, and feed in tran- 

 quillity on their parenchyma. Others form a nest by connecting several 

 leaves or flowers with silk. Some of them inhabit fruits. 



The posterior extremity of the body is narrow in several. Their cocoon 

 has the figure of a bateau, and is sometimes of pure silk, and at others mixed 

 with foreign matters. 



The Tortrices compose the subgenus PYRALIS, Fab. 



7. The GEOMETRY comprise Lepidoptera in which the body is usually 

 slender, the proboscis either nearly wanting, or generally but slightly 

 elongated, and almost membranous. The inferior palpi are small, and almost 

 cylindrical. The wings are simple, extended, or tectiform and flattened. The 

 antennae of several males are pectinated. The thorax is always smooth. The 

 caterpillars usually have but ten feet; the others present two more, and those 

 at the extremity always exist. Their peculiar mode of progression has caused 

 them to be styled Geometrce, or Measurers, When about to advance, they 

 first cling with their anterior or squamous feet, then elevate their body so as to 

 form a ring, in order to approximate the posterior extremity of the body to 

 the anterior, or that which is fixed; they cling with the last feet, disengage 

 the first, and move the body forwards, when they recommence the same 

 operation. Their attitude when at rest is singular. Fixed to a branch of 

 some plant by the last feet only, their body remains extended in a straight 

 line in the air, and absolutely motionless. So closely does the skin resemble 

 the branch in its colour and inequalities, that it is easy to confound them. In 

 this way and at an angle of forty -five degrees, or more, with the limb to which 

 they are attached, these animals remain for hours and even days. 



The chrysalides are almost naked, or their cocoon is extremely thin, and 

 poorly furnished with silk. 



This section, exclusive of the caterpillars, contains but one subgenus, or 

 PHAL.ENA proper. 



8. The DELTOIDES, Lat., consist of species very analogous to true Phalaenae, 

 but whose caterpillars have fourteen legs, and roll up leaves. In the perfect 

 insect the inferior palpi are elongated and recurved. Its wings and body, on 

 the sides of which the former are extended horizontally, form a sort of delta, 

 marked by a re-entering angle in the posterior side, or appearing to be forked. 

 The antennae are usually pectinated or ciliated. 



The Deltoides form the subgenus HERMINIA, Latreille. 



9. The TINEITES comprise the smallest species of this order. Their cater- 

 pillars are always closely shorn, furnished with sixteen feet at least, and recti- 

 grade, living concealed in dwellings fabricated by themselves, either fixed or 

 moveable. Here the wings form a sort of elongated and almost flattened tri- 

 angle, terminated by a re-entering angle; such are the Pyralides of Linnaeus; 

 they have four distinct and usually exposed palpi. There, the superior wings 

 are long and narrow, sometimes moulded on the body, and forming a sort of 

 rounded roof to it, sometimes almost perpendicularly decumbent and laid on 



