CUSPIDATES. 



211 



head is brown ; of the body glaucous green, 

 with a bright and distinct double stripe on 

 each side, which, commencing immediately 

 behind the head, ascends towards the back on 

 the sixth segment, and then, after descending, 

 is continued in a direct line to the base of one 

 of the caudal horns ; this stripe is divided 



oughout, the upper half being pink, the 

 >wer half white ; the dorsal area has an 

 oblique white streak on each side of each seg- 

 ment ; the caudal horns are blackish tipped 

 with red ; the spiracles are yellow ; the clas- 

 pers pale green. The CHKYSALIS is to be found 

 within a compact gummy cocoon on the trunks 

 of alders (AJnus glutinosa), and I believe that 

 is the only tree on which the caterpillar feeds : 

 as many as ten of the empty cocoons have 

 passed through my hands, all of them still 

 adhering to a portion of the alder bark. Mr. 

 Greene also says : " I have found the cocoons, 

 empty I am sorry to say, here on alder ; but 

 as yet all my efforts to find one from which 



e insect had not escaped have been fruitless. 



e vacant cocoons have been found almost 



ariably about four feet from the ground 

 on the north side of the tree. Very rarely 

 the caterpillar spins its cocoon on the wood 



,rk ?] and not in the crevices or chinks ; of 

 they (the cocoons) are much more easily 

 .elected iu the former situation, but I do not 

 remember to have seen it more than once. I 

 k it a good plan to scrape the trunk with 

 edge of the trowel." 



he MOTH appears on the wing in May. A<T 

 ircsent it seems to be a species of some rarity 

 in this country, but its range is rather exten- 

 sive. Its principal habitat is the Weald of 

 Sussex. " It has been taken several times at 

 Burton- on-Trent," also in Derbyshire, and 

 even as far north as Lancashire. (The scientific 

 name is Dicranura bicuspis.} This species must 

 not be confounded with the Centra bicuspis of 

 English authors, which, together with Cerura 

 inti'tjra and C. Ittti fascia of Stephens, must be 

 referred to my Dicranura furcula. It may 

 here be observed that nothing has so con- 



,ntly retarded the progress of entomology 



this country as the intense desire to make 

 species. 



386. The Sallow Kitten (Dicranura furcula). 



386. THE SALLOW KITTEN. The antennae 

 of the male are strongly pectinated, those of 

 the female slightly so ; the shaft of the an- 

 tennae is white, the pectinations black : the 

 fore wings are rather narrow, with a very 

 straight costa and a rounded tip ; their colour 

 is pale gray or whitish gray, with a broad 

 transverse median band of a darker gray ; the 

 interior margin of this band is straight, and is 

 bordered by a straight black line, and this is 

 accompanied by a straight yellow line ; the 

 exterior margin has a wide concave notch near 

 the costa, and an obtuse angle below the 

 notch ; it is bordered by black and yellow like 

 the interior margin, but these colours, and in- 

 deed the boundary of the band, almost disap- 

 pear as the latter gradually slopes towards the 

 anal angle and approaches the inner margin : 

 'between the band and the base of the wing is 

 a transverse series of five black spots, and at 

 the base of the wing is a single black spot ; 

 exterior to the band is a small circular discoidal 

 spot ; and again beyond this are three zigzag 

 black lines, the third expanding into a large 

 transverse dark gray blotch on the costa ; on 

 the hind margin itself is a series of eight small 

 circular black spots : the hind wings of the 

 male are white with an occasional smoke- 

 coloured cloud and a marginal series of black 

 dots : in some of the females the hind wings 

 are white, in others smoky ; the marginal 

 black spots are always present : the head and 

 collar are white ; the thorax is whitish with 

 three transverse black bars more or less 

 interspersed with yellow ; the body is gray 

 with smoke-coloured bands. 



The EGGS are laid singly on the leaves of 

 several species of the genus Salix, more par- 

 ticularly those called sallows (Sf(li,r capra-.a 



