﻿1870]. 235 



Description of the larva, of Epunala lutulenta. — On the 8th October, 1868, Mr. 

 Henry Terry, of St. Marychurch, captured a ? of this species, and having induced 

 her to deposit her eggs in captivity, he kindly sent me a portion of them, retaining 

 some for himself, aad sending others to the Rev. E. Horton. 



The egg of lutulenta is circular, a little depressed at top, and flattened beneath, 

 ribbed and beaded ; when first laid it is of a canary yellow, and changes in a few 

 days to a pale pinkish grey-brown, having the top and a broad zone round the 

 middle of the sides of a much darker tint of the same : in about a month it 

 changes to a purplish grey tint, and just before hatching assumes the bloom-like 

 appearance of a purple grape. 



The last change was simultaneously assumed by all the eggs in my possession 

 on November the 22nd, that is about six weeks after they had been laid, but from 

 some reason or other unknown to me, no more than two larva? were hatched out ; 

 my friends, as will be seen below, were more fortunate. 



The young larva? at first has a very dark purplish-brown head, the body pale 

 dirty greenish and translucent, the internal organs showing through the skin give 

 the appearance of a broad dark grey stripe down the back ; there is a dark brown 

 plate on the second and on the anal segments ; the tubercular dots distinct, and 

 blackish, each having a rather long dark brown hair. 



My young larva? fed freely on Poa annua, but, the grass becoming infected with 

 mildew, they both suddenly died on the 14th January, 1869. I am, however, able to 

 carry on their history, Mr. Terry having kindly forwarded me some of his batch on 

 February 20th ; these were then three-eighths of an inch long, of a full green on 

 the back and sides, the ventral surface rather paler ; the most noticeable feature 

 at that time was the sub-spiracular stripe being whitish or greenish- white in some, 

 yellowish or of a pale flesh tint in others ; and by aid of a lens one could see that 

 the dorsal line was of the ground colour, finely outlined with darker green, and 

 the sub-dorsal paler green also outlined with darker ; also that the ground colour 

 of the back was delicately freckled over with darker green, an unfreckled plate of 

 green on the second segment, and the head both paler. 



These individuals fed tolerably well for some days on mixed grasses sown in a 

 pot, and they varied their food a little by feeding on some of a miscellaneous 

 collection of plants that had sprung up with the grass, especially on Potentilla 

 fragrariastrum , leaving chickweed and trefoil almost untouched ; however, they 

 had never seemed healthy since their arrival, and they soon began to die off, the 

 longest-lived going about the middle of March. 



Soon after this, I became aware that the Eev. E. Horton had been more 

 successful, and though his stock of young larva? kept out of doors during the 

 winter had been a temptation to robins as choice morsels of food not to be resisted, 

 yet there remained one solitary individual uneaten, which he most kindly entrusted 

 to my care, and on May 8th, I had the satisfaction of figuring it. 



This larva was then one inch one-eighth in length, and moderately stout, of 

 the usual Noctua form, its colour a bright yellowish-green, finely freckled with 

 paler green, the segmental folds showing yellow ; the dorsal stripe of darker green, 

 the sub-dorsal stripe of very pale rather dull yellowish-green ; the spiracles whitish 

 placed on a thin dingy red line, and close beneath them a, rather broad stripe 

 tapering at each end of greenish ochreous, edged above and below with whitish 



