306 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



of mine, this great moth, for I have kept so many hundreds of 

 them, and have admired the wondrous details of their anatomy 

 so often, that I am always glad to say a kind word for a creature 

 which has afforded me so much amusement and instruction. 



Among the pensile insects may be reckoned the beautiful BuE- 

 NET Moth {Anthrocera Jilipendulce), an insect which has already 

 been mentioned while treating of the pensile hymenoptera. 



This insect, which is well known for its splendid colors of deep 

 velvet green and blazing scarlet, is also notable for the shape of 

 its antennae, which are so swollen toward the tips as to induce 

 many persons to reckon the insect as a butterfly rather than a 

 moth. 



The shape of the cocoon of the Burnet Moth is not unlike that 

 of the Tiger Moth, but its material and position are very different. 

 The cocoon of the tiger moth is slung horizontally, in hammock 

 fashion, while that of the Burnet is set perpendicularly, and fast- 

 ened to the upper part of a grass stem, one side being firmly 

 pressed against it. The substance of the cocoon is quite opaque, 

 grayish, rather stout, very tough, and having the silken threads, 

 of which it is chiefly made, so conspicuous, that many persons 

 take the cocoon to be the work of a spider. 



Sometimes in a field, or even in a limited portion of a field, 

 these cocoons are so numerous that, at a little distance, they look 

 almost as if they were the seeds of a plant rather than the cocoons 

 of an insect. In such cases the moths themselves may generally 

 be found near the cocoons, sometimes being on the ground and 

 sometimes on the wing. These moths are peculiarly liable to the 

 attacks of the ichneumon flies, for not only does the Burnet ich- 

 neumon make them its special prey, but I have seen a large per- . 

 centage of the cocoons bored full of holes, which show that one 

 of the parasitic hymenopteras has laid its eggs in the caterpillar ; 

 that the young have been developed, and made their escape to 

 continue the work of destruction ; and that the caterpillar which 

 nurtured them is lying dead within its useless cocoon. 



There are others of our finest and yet commonest moths which 

 make to themselves pensile habitations in which they pass the 

 long time of helplessness when they are in the pupal state. Any 

 thing more utterly helpless than the pupa of certain moths can 

 not well be imagined, their only protection consisting either in 



