17 



to the flower heads of Ltizula, Broniiis, Dactylus, Festuca, and 

 other grasses on which they are fond of sleeping. 



One day, a few summers ago, I was collecting along a row 

 of trees backed by a hedge, looking for insects which might 

 be sheltering from a violent storm of wind which had sprung 

 up ; and was greatly interested to notice that some little 

 bushes of Popidus alba (springing, as they always do, from 

 the roots of the trees) were chosen as resting-places by the 

 hosts of Pieris brassiccB and P. rapcB, which were unable to face 

 the wind. Here, sitting on the white undersides of the leaves, 

 they were safe from notice, until beaten out in dozens at 

 a time. 



One of the most extraordinary cases of mimicry that I 

 know of, is between Chesias spartiata and the dead dry pods 

 of its food plant, the common broom {Cytisus scoparius). 

 The pods when ripe split down the front, drop their seeds and 

 spread open wide, so as to become nearly flat, showing the 

 rounded hollows which the seeds have occupied. The moth 

 sits on the broom bushes in the evening, with its wings hanging 

 in precisely the same posture, and of much the same dark 

 colour, and actually has, in a line, obliquely, on each fore 

 wing, three oval markings of ringed appearance, and of the 

 size of the hollows in which the seeds have lain. Mimicry 

 could hardly go further than this, yet it is almost exceeded in 

 oddity by that of Laverna phragmitella, which, when sitting 

 on the old seed head of Typha latifolia from which it has just 

 emerged, looks exactly like one of the little tufts of pappus 

 which burst out and lie upon the surface of the over-ripe seed 

 head, the lines and ocellus on the fore-wings completing the 

 deception ; and again by Coleophora annnlatella, which, when 

 swept up, and sitting on the side of the net, is hardly dis- 

 tinguishable from the two-awned husks of Bromus sterilis, 

 which, growing among its food plant, Chenopodium, get swept 

 into the net at the same time. 



An interesting case of adaptation, rather than of actual 

 resemblance, is that of Coccyx strobilella to the tips of the scales 

 of the spruce fir cone from which it has just emerged. The 

 colour is totally different, but the scale has strong curves at 

 the apex, and the moth sits in them so closely as to har- 

 monize with the shadow of the curve. On the other hand, a 

 most unaccountable case of resemblance is that of Gelechia 

 senectella, in a marsh in which it is common, to a small 

 Hemipteron which is plentiful at the same place. Both are 

 of the same size, shape and colour, and, after sweeping, it is 

 not easy to distinguish in the net, which is a moth and which 



