468 



BRITISH MOTHS. 



hind wings, head, thorax, and body are con- 

 colorous with the fore wings. 



The CATERPILLAR is beautifully figured by 

 Sepp : it has the head porrected, flattened, 

 not notched on the crown, and rather narrower 

 than the second segment ; the body is rather 

 long and leech-like, and tapers slightly to- 

 wards the anal extremity ; it is arched in 

 crawling like the Geometers, the first pair of 

 claspers being raised and relaxing their hold 

 on the food-plant ; there is a small excrescence 

 on each side of the fifth segment, and there 

 are two dorsal papillae on the twelfth, and two 

 smaller ones on the thirteenth segment ; the 

 anal claspers are long, slender, protruded back- 

 wards, and spreading ; the colour of the head 

 is light brown or greenish-brown, with two 

 darker or reddish-brown streaks down the 

 face, but united by a band above the moiith : 

 the body is bistre-brown, with a very narrow 

 chain-like stripe containing, as it were, two 

 beads in each segment ; on each side of this is 

 a broader stripe very dark-coloured, but inter- 

 sected throughout by a chain of pale spots ; 

 below this broader stripe ai'e three line-like 

 stripes extending the entire length of the in- 

 sect. 



Some specimens have a pale-yellow stripe 

 in the region of the spiracles. It feeds on 

 oak (Quercus Robur}. 



The MOTH appears on the wing in May. A 

 specimen was taken in Hampshire by Captain 

 Chawner, another at West Wickham, in 

 Surrey, by Mr. Smith, and two at Killarney, 

 in Ireland, by the late Peter Bouchard. (The 

 scientific name is Ophiodes lunaris.} 



720. The Mother Shipton (Eudidia Mi). 



720. THE MOTHER SHIPTOX. The palpi are 

 short and curved upwards, the second joint 

 dotted with bristly scales, the terminal joint 



naked ; the antennse are slightly pubescent in 

 the male, simple in the female : the fore wings' 

 are slightly hollowed along the costa until 

 near the tip, then slightly arched; their colour 

 is sepia-brown with several dirty white lines ; 

 the orbicular is a round black spot, the reni- 

 form an oblique black spot, the space between 

 them being pale ; beyond the reniform is a 

 sliort transverse whitish line, which may be 

 supposed to mark its outer border ; beyond 

 this is a curiously contorted white line : it 

 begins on the costa and descends nearly to the 

 anal angle, then turns upwards towards the 

 reniform, but before touching, it again descends 

 to the inner margin, where it is again 

 benfc, and finally ascends to the costa near its 

 base : the hind wings are sepia-brown, with 

 numerous pale spots, a series of which form 

 an irregular transverse band ; the head, thorax, 

 and body are sepia-brown, the last with deli- 

 cate white rings. 



The CATERPILLAR is figured by Hubner : it 

 rests with the anterior extremity elevated and 

 the back slightly arched : the head is about 

 equal in width to the second segment ; it is 

 semi-prone, and not conspicuously notched on 

 the crown : the body is slender and almost 

 uniformly cylindrical, but tapers towards the 

 posterior extremity ; there are but two pairs 

 of ventral claspers, and these are situated on 

 the ninth and . tenth segments ; the anal 

 claspers are rather long and spreading; the 

 colour of the head and body is pale gray ap- 

 proaching to putty-coloured; the head has a 

 longitudinal stripe down the middle of the 

 face; the body has four whitish stripes ex- 

 tending from the head to the anal claspers, all 

 of them having a delicate black margin ; the 

 legs and claspers are of the same colour as the 

 body ; it feeds on the common melilot trefoil, 

 and changes to a smooth CHRYSALIS of a bright 

 red-brown colour, and having six or eight 



* O O 



sharp anal points. 



The MOTH appears on the wing in June, and 

 occurs almost everywhere in England, Scot- 

 land, and Ireland. (The scientific name is 

 Eudidia J/i.) 



