318 THE GEOMETRINA. 



thus driven perforce, at the present stage of our busi- 

 ness, to devote our principal attention to the powers 

 of eating possessed by our favourites. This applies 

 particularly to the moths of the last tribe, and of that 

 the characters of which we have now to examine, for 

 when we have said that they eat vigorously (rather 

 too much so for our private satisfaction in many cases), 

 sleep soundly in their pupa-skins, and rouse them- 

 selves to do their duty in providing for the con- 

 tinuance of their race, we have said pretty nearly all 

 that can be said of their general history. This, how- 

 ever, will not be sufficient for our present purpose, 

 and I shall therefore give a sketch of the history of 

 one of the commonest and most striking of our British 

 species of these Moths. 



In the month of July, if we visit any garden in or 

 near which currant and gooseberry bushes grow, when 

 the shades of evening are rapidly closing in, our at- 

 tention will infallibly be attracted to the numerous 

 white objects which are flitting about in all direc- 

 tions. If one of these be captured, it is found to be 

 a slender-bodied moth, with large white wings, mea- 

 suring from an inch and a half to two inches in ex- 

 panse, elegantly marked with black spots, of which a 

 double series, towards the hinder margin of the ante- 

 rior wing, enclosing a yellow space between them, form 

 a sort of waved band running quite across the wing. 

 A similar arrangement of colour, but on a smaller 

 scale, is seen quite at the base of the wings, and the 

 body is yellow, with the head and antennae black. 

 This is the ordinary appearance of the insect, which, 

 however, is liable to vary to an extraordinary extent, 

 so that individuals may be met with in which the 

 wings are almost entirely white, whilst in others the 



