﻿378 LEPIDOPTERA 



head, the use of which is unknown : ' they arise by slender stalks 

 behind and above the eyes, are about as long as the head, and 

 are easily broken off. After hatching, the young larva, when it 

 begins to feed, fastens two leaves together with silk threads, and 

 so feeds after the fashion of a Turtricid, rather than a case-making, 

 larva. Subsequently, however, the caterpillar entirely detaches 

 two pieces of leaves and fastens them together at the edges, thus 

 constructing a case that it lives in, and carries about; it can 

 readily leave the case and afterwards return to it. When at 

 rest, the larva relieves itself from the effort of supporting this 

 case by the device of fastening it to a leaf with a few silken 

 threads : when the creature wished to start again, " it came out 

 and bit off these threads close to the case." Subsequently it 

 changes inside the case to a pupa armed with transverse rows of 

 teeth, like so many other pupae that are capable of a certain 

 amount of movement. The larva is of broad, short, peculiar 

 form, and is said to be very bold in defending itself when at- 

 tacked. The moth is somewhat like the silkworm moth, though 

 of a more tawny colour. Newman does not allude to any 

 cephalic appendages as existing in the larva of P. batesi, 

 If we accept the eggs figured and described by Snellen,' 2 as those 

 of P. batesi, it is possible that this Insect possesses a peculiar 

 mode of oviposition, the eggs being placed one on the other, so 

 as to form an outstanding string; but we think this example 

 probably abnormal; the mode is not shared by P. melsheimeH. 

 The genus Lacosoma is considered by Packard to be an ally of 

 Perophora. The caterpillar of L. chiridota doubles a leaf at the 

 mid-rib and fastens the two edges together, thus forming an un- 

 symmetrical case. Many larvae of Microlepidoptera do something- 

 like this, but the Lacosoma cuts off the habitation thus formed and 

 carries it about. Packard says it may have descended from 

 ancestors with ordinary habits and that certain peculiar obsolete 

 markings on the body of the caterpillar may be indications of this. 5 

 The Argentinian Insect Mam ill o curtisea 4 is also probably an ally 



1 Dyar says, ' : We may surmise that it i> to present a terrifying appearance to- 

 ward small enemies." He calls the Insect both Perophora and Gicmnus, melshei- 

 meri, and states that it belongs [according to the larva] to Tineidae ; the appendages 

 he considers to be enormously developed setae. J. If. York ent. Sue. iv. 1896, p. 92. 



2 Tijdsehr. Ent. xxxviii. 1895, p. 56, PI. 4. 



3 Ann. New York Ac. viii. 1893, p. 48. 



4 Weyenbergh, Tijdsehr. Ent. xvii. 1874. p. 220, PI. xiii. 



