ri4 STRANGE DWELLINGS. 



enabling the insect to escape at once into the outer world. In 

 some instances, however, this is not the case, and in tlie present 

 specimen the empty chrysalis shell may be seen, its shattered 

 sides showing the manner in which the inclosed moth made its 

 exit. The hole through which the moth emerged from the 

 cocoon is of a wonderfully small size, considering the dimensions 

 of the perfect insect, and its sides are very ragged and irregular. 

 Like the other cocoons, it is strongly imbued with the charac- 

 teristic odour, which has attached itself so strongly to my fingers 

 that careful ablution will be needed before I shall venture to 

 produce my hands in society. 



Some of the most elegant and curious British Lepidoptera 

 are also among the most destructive. 



The various species belonging to the remarkable family 

 ^geriadae, properly called Clear-wing Moths, are terrible 

 enemies to the gardener, as well as to the landowner, their 

 larvae feeding upon the pith, and generally preferring the 

 young wood to that of a more advanced growth. In some 

 cases they live in the roots, and are quite as destructive as 

 their relations who prefer the branches. All the Clear-wings 

 are distinguished by the fact that the greater part of their 

 wings is simply membraneous and transparent, without the 

 beautiful feathery scales that are worn by the Lepidoptera as 

 an order. Some of them resemble hornets, others are often 

 mistaken for wasps, while several species are wonderfully like 

 gnats, and as they fly about in the sunshine may readily be 

 mistaken for these insects. 



Of one of these insects, Algeria asiliformis^ known to col- 

 lectors as the Breeze-fly Clear-wing, Mr. J. Rennie writes 

 as follows : ' We observed above a dozen of them, during this 

 summer, in the trunk of a poplar, one side of which had been 

 stripped of its bark. It was this portion of the trunk which 

 all the caterpillars selected for their final retreat, not one having 

 been observed where the tree was covered with bark. The 

 ingenuity of the little architect consisted in scraping the cell 

 almost to the very surface of the wood, leaving only an exterior 



