MICROPTERYX CALTHELLA. 141 



would be one or two intermediate stages between the young larva and 

 the smallest seen at this date. The intestinal contents, so far as they 

 are visible through the larva, were, in one instance, green, in two 

 others, brownish. Occasionally, a good end view of the larva is seen, 

 and then its angularity (on cross-section) is very evident, the spaces 

 between the double rows of processes being hollow, and the processes 

 placed on the angles of a flat, raised surface. The long antennae, 

 Chapman says, have an elegant curvature, and are placed on the head 

 so as to look, as it moves from side to side, ridiculously like the horns 

 on a Hereford ox — the proportionate length of horn to head being not 

 very different in the two cases. In 1893, Chapman obtained a large 

 number of eggs and young larva?, and early in November discovered 

 two full-grown larvae. The remainder seem to have perished. 



Larva. — The young larva is altogether unlike our ideas of a 

 lepidopterous insect. It is very delicate, and shrivels rapidly by 

 desiccation when removed from its natural habitat in damp moss. 

 The peculiarities of its form and structure may be stated to be its 

 angular outline, the possession of a number of remarkable appendages 

 to each segment, of eight pairs of abdominal legs of unusual structure, 

 and of an oval sucker ; that the antenna? are remarkably long for a 

 lepidopterous larva, and that the head is retractile, so far, that it may 

 occupy the interior of the mesothoracic segment. The larva does not 

 appear to alter these characters during its growth to maturity. The 

 antenna? of the adult larva are not, perhaps, proportionately so long, 

 and the abdominal legs have shorter and thicker bases. 



The larva is thick and short and fairly cylindrical, apart from its 

 angular section, and tapers very little, terminating rather abruptly at 

 either end, especially when sulky and with retracted head. The 

 angular outline is due to ten (not eight as first described) rows of 

 peculiar appendages, so disposed as to form two subdorsal rows and 

 two lateral rows on either side, each double row arising from the 

 angles of a raised ridge, and the intervening spaces being rather 

 hollowed. Another row low down on either side homologises with 

 the row of prolegs on its own side, thus making, with the prolegs, 12 

 rows of appendages arranged in pairs. The general surface is raised 

 in ridges, or rather marked by sulci that are chiefly transverse in 

 direction, but communicate with each other to form a network, and, 

 in places, make a beautiful rosetted pattern. The general result 

 is a division of each segment into five subsegments, the balls or 

 appendages are on the third of these. The fourth and fifth, in the 

 centre of the dorsum and again in the centre of the space between the 

 subdorsal and lateral pairs of ridges, are united into one by a circular area, 

 in the centre of which is a dot or spot. This description applies to the 

 mesothorax, metathorax, and the first to seventh abdominal segments. 

 The prothorax has two transverse rows of ball appendages, with six in 

 the first row and four in the second. On the 8th abdominal segment, 

 the appendages are similarly in two rows, but deficient in number, 

 there being only eight altogether ; whilst on the. 9th abdominal seg- 

 ment there are only six. These appendages on the 8th and 9th 

 abdominal segments are longer, larger and more club-shaped, and 

 project backwards from their points of attachment ; those on the 

 other segments are shorter and more rounded, and are directed forward ; 

 those on the prothorax are, however, similarly a little larger and 



