233 
the Lepidoptera of St. Helena. 
(if truly indigenous) may perhaps have belonged to the now 
well-nigh extinct scrubwood fauna. Most of my specimens, 
however, I captured at Plantation, where I also procured two 
examples of a very handsome albino variety, which is most 
beautifully suffused throughout with a pale ochreous-golden 
hue. 
Genus 13. Heliothis, Treitschke. 
Heliothis insularis. 
Anchoscelis'Hnsularis, Walk, in Melliss, St. Hel. 182 (1875), 
This is one of the handsomest and most abundant of the 
St.-Helena Noctuas, and one, too, of which I secured the 
caterpillar commonly enough at Plantation. However, un¬ 
fortunately I seem to have mislaid the description which I 
took of the latter, and therefore am unable to add it here, as I 
should otherwise have done. 
Genus 14. Ach^EA, Hiibn. 
Acliaea melicerta , Drury. 
This handsome moth appears to be somewhat scarce in the 
island, or, at any rate, very local. It occurs principally at 
low elevations about Jamestown ; and the caterpillars are to be 
met with pretty abundantly in the Botanic Gardens, where 
they feed upon the leaves of the pomegranate. As, however, 
we were resident at Plantation (which is some 1800 feet above 
the sea), I had little opportunity myself of searching for the 
larva*.; but a chrysalis, which had a most beautiful bloom upon 
it of a purplish tinge, and which turned to a very perfect 
imago, was procured for me by Mr. N. Janisch. 
Genus 15. OrmoDES, Gudn. 
Ophiodes tirrhcea , Cram. 
This large and extremely handsome moth is not at all un¬ 
common both at low and intermediate altitudes. I did not, 
however, myself meet with it lower than the Briars; and I 
had two or three chrysalises sent to me from Woodcot ; but 
most of my imagos I found at Plantation. This species has a 
curious habit of lying concealed upon the grass in the day¬ 
time, where it is hardly distinguishable from the rough, mat¬ 
like, and often much-burnt-up surface, to which it wonderfully 
assimilates. Ophiodes tirrhcea occurs both in North and 
South Africa, as likewise in France, Spain, Carniola, Dal¬ 
matia, Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, Mauritius, and also in the 
Canary Islands. 
[To be continued.] 
