318 OAK LAPPET. 



Having said as much, of our night-fliers, with reference to 

 peculiarities of size and colour, as our prescribed limits will 

 permit, we shall now notice a few of them distinguished 

 especially with regard to form. Amongst the latter is the 

 moth called the Oak Lappet,* already made known to our 

 readers as a " Walking Leaf' 1 the only specimen of British 

 growth ; and the very image of a "feuille morte" or, more 

 properly, of several dead leaves together, does it present, in 

 its large wings of rusty brown, deeply indented, and project- 

 ing, the hindmost beyond the foremost pair.f 



These moths are further remarkable for corporations of most 

 portly dimensions, especially in the female, from whence their 

 scientific name of Gastropacha, signifying, thick bodies. 

 Their caterpillars are dusky gray or brown, with two velvety 

 blue spots or slits behind the head, and along each side is a 

 row of pendulous projections, which, from their fancied re- 

 semblance to lappets, gave rise to the popular name of " Lap- 

 pet Moth." It is found, as a caterpillar, on various grasses, 

 the sloe, pear, willow, bramble, and hawthorn survives the 

 winter, enters in May the chrysalidan cover, and thence ex- 

 pands about mid-summer a mimic leaf of autumn. 



In the majority of moths the hinder wings are rounded ; 

 but in the " Swallow-tail " we meet with a remarkable devi- 

 ation from this usual form the hindmost pinions being pro- 

 longed, as well as the foremost, into an acute taU. 



* Gastropacha quertifolia. * Vignette to " Resemblance and Relation." 



