84 AGARISTA PICT A. 



ened towards the extremity, at which they again be- 

 come slender and have the point recurved ; but the 

 latter is never furnished with a pencil of hairs. The 

 spiral tongue is long and conspicuous ; the palpi are 

 also developed, and consist of three joints. In Aga- 

 rista these joints are elongated, the second very 

 much compressed, the terminal one slender and 

 nearly naked. The fore tibiae are provided with 

 spurs. 



The Agaristse fly by day, and are similar in their 

 habits to the hawk-moths ; they do not, however, 

 possess the same power of sustained and vigorous 

 flight as the latter. Their metropolis is New Hol- 

 land, although individual species occur elsewhere ; 

 A. octomaculata, for example, is a native of South 

 America. * Lewin has made us acquainted with the 

 metamorphoses of one of the species, viz. A . Glycine?, 

 which he figures and describes in his Lepidoptera of 

 New South Wales (pi. 1), under the name of Pha- 

 Icenoides Glycince. The caterpillar has no resem- 

 blance to that of a hawk-moth, but is cylindrical 

 and hairy, the anal segment with an indistinct tuber- 

 cular elevation on the back. It does not confine 

 itself for food to any one family of plants. Before 

 changing to a pupa, it spun a slight w r eb on the 

 under side of a branch, in the month of January, 

 in which the chrysalis remained for seventy-five 

 days, the winged insect emerging in April. 



* We are acquainted with this species only from a descrip- 

 tion in the Ency. Meth. It may possibly turn out not to be a 

 true Agarista. 



