LEPIDOPTERA. 279 
caterpillar has the form of a worm, and is of a glossy whiteness, 
with a few hairs thinly sprinkled over it and a grey line on 
its back. It is enclosed in a tube, or sheath, 
open at both ends, in the interior of which 
is a sort of tissue of wool, sometimes blue, 
sometimes green, sometimes red, according to 
the colour of the stuff to which the insect Fig. 2 e Neoleanes 
attaches itself and which it despoils. The 
exterior of this sheath is, on the contrary, formed of silk made 
by the insect itself, of a whitish colour. 
The caterpillars are hardly hatched before they begin to clothe 
themselves. Réaumur observed one of these worms during the 
operation of enlarging its case. To do this it put its head out of 












Fig. 294.—Larve of the Woollen Moth (Zinea tapezella). 
one of the extremities of its sheath, and looked about eagerly, to 
the right and to the left, for those bits of wool which suited it 
best for weaving in. In Fig. 294, we see two larve occupied in 
eating a piece of cloth. 
“The larva changes its place continually and very quickly,” 
says Réaumur. “Tf the threads of wool which are near it are not 
such as it desires, it draws sometimes more than half its body 
out of its case to go and look for better ones farther off. If it 
finds a bit that pleases, the head remains fixed for an instant; it 
then seizes the thread with the two mandibles which are below its 
head, tears the bit out after redoubled efforts, and immediately 
