CATERPILLAR BOX. 125 



refuse to be straightened. It is as impossible to 

 straighten a rolled-up hedgehog as a caterpillar in a 

 similar attitude ; and if force is used in either case, 

 the creature will be mortally injured. However, 

 gentle means succeed when violence fails, with 

 insects as with men. A Bheel robber will steal the 

 bedding from under a sleeping man without waking 

 him ; and, by an analogous process, the refractory 

 caterpillar is lodged in his prison before he is 

 fairly awake to his condition. 



The entomologist feels a justifiable pride in exe- 

 cuting similar achievements ; for there is quite as 

 much force of intellect needed to outwit a caterpillar 

 as a quadruped. 



When the drinker caterpillar passes into its 

 pupal state, it makes for itself a very curious cocoon, 

 not unlike a weaver's shuttle in shape, being large in 

 the middle, and tapering to a point at each end. 

 The texture is soft and flexible, as if the cocoon 

 were made of very thin felt, and the 

 larval hairs are quite distinguishable 

 on its surface. The moth leaves the 

 cocoon about August, For the cocoon 

 see fig. 1 c. 



I found that few caterpillars are so 

 liable to the attack of ichneumon flies 

 as those of the drinker moth. A co- C0C00N op THE 



EMPEROR MOTH. 



coon now before me is pierced with 

 thirteen holes from which ichneumon flies have 



9 



