The egg-laying of our British Lasiocampids is exceedingly variable 

 for so small a number of species, and some of the modes adopted 

 are striking and peculiar. The egg-laying of Malacosoma neustria, 

 M. casffensis, and Eriogaster lanestris is remarkable. These species 

 lay their eggs in the form of a necklace round and round a twig, the 

 eggs of the first being embedded in a stiff liquid glue, the last covered 

 with a thick covering of long silky hairs, mouse-coloured in tint to 

 the naked eye, but seen to be formed of black and white fibres under 

 a microscope. The eggs of T. cralcegl and P. popidi are both laid 

 in linear series side by side on a branch, whilst those of M. riibi are 

 attached to almost anything in the near neighbourhood of their food. 

 The eggs of L. trifolii are slightly attached to stems of grass or other 

 plants, and so also are those of C. poiaforia. It is reported that 

 L. queixfis sprinkles its eggs loosely, but I am not so sure that this is 

 absolutely true. It will, I know, like C. potatoria, lay them freely in 

 one's hand w^hilst one is holding the moth, but I have somewhere read 

 that the calhincB form has been seen attaching its eggs to a heather 

 twig. Chapman notes the eggs of Eutricha quercifolia as laid in 

 small groups (half-a-dozen or more) on twigs, and placed more or 

 less on each other. 1 know nothing of how the eggs of E. ilicifolia 

 are laid, and should be glad of information. 



To return to the mode of egg-laying adopted by Malacosoma 

 ?ie2istria, M. castrensis, and Eriogaster lanestris, it will be observed 

 that their peculiar mode of attachment gives them the appearance of 

 being upright rather than flat eggs, /. e. their micropylar axis appears 

 to be vertical, and not horizontal, to the surface on which they are 

 laid. This is due to the fact that they are not really attached to the 

 twig round which they are placed, but are actually laid on each 

 other. 



The Lasiocampid larvte are exceedingly beautiful creatures, densely 

 hairy, usually with the primary tubercles very ill-developed and much 

 obscured by the secondary hairs, which form a thick coating spread 

 over the whole of the skin. These latter hairs are, however, developed 

 particularly in those directions that increase the resemblance of the 

 larvse to their food-plants in the group that includes Eutricha querci- 

 folia, as well as in that containing Tricliiura cratcBgi. The larva of 

 L. quercus, too, in spite of its striking intersegmental and lateral 

 tints, is very inconspicuous when stretched at length on a twig 

 of hawthorn, maple, or sloe. 



Another characteristic of the larvae of this group is the gregarious 

 habit which in some of the species is very remarkable. M. neustria 

 and castrensis are well-known examples, and in America the allies of 

 the former species have earned the popular name of tent caterpillars. 

 But they are probably outdone by E. lanestris, which sometimes 

 forms a huge web extending over a considerable area, and into which 

 the larvae retire when not feeding or sunning themselves. 



Bacot says that the larvse fall broadly into two groups : — (t) Con- 

 taining quercfis, castrensis, neustria, &c., of which he considers 



