626 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



shifted to a black cloth, and when it has cut the longitudinal slit, 

 and has half filled it up, it can be transferred to a piece of scarlet 

 cloth, so that the complementary colors of green and scarlet are 

 brought into juxtaposition, and "thrown out" by the contrast 

 with the black. 



The caterpillar is not very particular as to the kind of material 

 which it employs and on which it feeds. Mr. Eennie makes the 

 following observations on one of these creatures, whose proceed- 

 ings he had watched. "The caterpillar first took up its abode in 

 a specimen of the ghost moth (Ifejnalus humuli), where, finding 

 few suitable materials for building, it had recourse to the cork of 

 the drawer, with the chips of which it made a structure almost 

 as warm as it would have done from wool. Whether it took of- 

 fense at our disturbing it one day, or whether it did not find suf- 

 ficient food in the body of the ghost moth, we know not; but it 

 left its cork house, and traveling about eighteen inches, selected 

 the ' old lady' moth (Mormo maura), one of the largest insects in 

 the drawer, and built a new apartment, composed partly of cork 

 as before, and partly of bits clipped out of the moth's wings. 



"We have seen these caterpillars form their habitations of 

 every sort of insect, from a butterfly to a beetle, and the soft, 

 feathery wings of moths answer their purpose very well; but 

 when they fall in with such hard materials as the musk beetle, 

 or the large scolopendra of the West Indies, they find some diffi- 

 culty in the building. 



"When the structure is finished, the insect deems itself secure 

 to feed on the materials of the cloth, or other animal matter with- 

 in its reach, provided it is dry, and free from fat or grease, which 

 Reaumur found it would not touch. For building, it always se- 

 lects the straightest and loosest pieces of wood ; but for food it 

 prefers the shortest and most compact; and to procure these, it 

 eats into the body of the stuff, rejecting the pile or nap, which it 

 necessarily cuts across at the origin and permits to fall, leaving it 

 threadbare, as if it had been much worn." 



From the account which has just been given, it is evident that 

 the caterpillar must be able to turn completely round in its case, 

 and in order to enable it to perform this evolution, the tube is 

 much wider in the middle than at the ends. 



The instinct of the parent moth enables it to discover with as- 

 tonishing certainty any substance which may afford food to its 

 future young. Stuffed birds suffer terribly from the moth, be- 



