100 TIGER CATEEPILLAK. 



broods of tlie same Caterpillar, these, like the little individuals 

 just encountered, have been, since an early stage, quite sta- 

 tionary as to growth, nearly the same as to motion, have kept 

 on the same coats, instead of often changing them, and it is 

 only in mild weather that they eat sparingly of the leaves of 

 dandelion, wherewith it is not easy to supply them. When 

 the latter are entirely nipped by frost or covered by snow, our 

 little winterers subsist as well without them, upon sleep. In 

 this, their nice and altered adaptation to a rigorous season and 

 short supplies, are not the growth and appetite even of these 

 Caterpillars worthy of notice ? 



With the arrival of April, and a plentiful supply of dock 

 and dandelion green meat, we shall find in our little " Tigers " 

 a proportionate increase of activity and appetite ; their skins, 

 as they increase in size, will be frequently cast, and in May, 

 each having attained to the full measure of its growth, will dis- 

 play to great advantage its jerkin of black velvet, ornamented 

 with rows of white studs, from each of which springs a long tuft 

 of gold-brown grey-tipped hairs, forming, en masse, an upper 

 coat of fur. Our Caterpillar will then speedily repay us for 

 the trouble of his keep, by showing how cleverly he can make 

 his cocoon, spinning it of his own silk, interweaving it with 

 hair plucked from his own body, and eking out these natural 

 materials by extraneous ones, such as grains of earth, pieces of 

 leaf, or even bits of paper when placed within his reach. 

 Shut up in this secure asylum he will become a chrysalis, and 



