236 BRITSIH LEPIDOPTERA. 



Sexual dimorphism. — Male : The anterior wings have the dark and 

 light reticulation of the Taleporiidae, and their outline is very like that 

 of T. tubulosa, i.e., that whilst the wing is long and narrow, and with a 

 pointed apex, and the distal portion of the costa curved, the proximal 

 portion is also curved slightly as in T. tubulosa, and not straight as in 

 B. sepium, nevertheless the intermediate portion is straighter than in 

 the former. The general tone of colour is a leaden or dove-colour, 

 rather than the yellow-brown or -grey so frequent in Micro-Psychids, 

 but some have a yellowish tendency. The reticulations are less dis- 

 tinct than in Bankesia, nearer a somewhat suffused T. tubulosa, and 

 very nearly as much as W. reticella in actual pattern. The forewings 

 have a black line along the hind margin usually broken up into a series 

 of spots (occasionally almost evanescent), and rarely affecting the 

 fringes, into which, however, the dots sometimes run. There is 

 usually a curved mark at end of cell (as there is often also in T. 

 tubulosa) and two others basal to it. All the markings are scraps of 

 transverse lines, or bands, and are too irregular for description, though 

 one, often marked just inside apex, may be noted ; all are somewhat 

 curved with concavity basal. The hindwings are pale dove-colour, 

 and, being free from the reticulations of the forewings, look paler. 

 There is a tendency to darker scaling along the nervures, which is 

 usually pronounced into actual black spots at the margins of the wings 

 and into the fringes. Female : The anterior winglet is narrow, forming 

 a nearly black filament eight or ten times as long as broad, longer and 

 narrower than 1st tibia, hanging directly ventrally, and having the ap- 

 pearance of being jointed at its base ; the posterior wing parallel to it, 

 about one-third its length, rather broader and decidedly paler. Head and 

 thorax dark [in B. sepium there are two (one on either side) pale square 

 patches on mesothorax whilst in L. lapidella, the hind margin of the dark 

 plate is a little scooped out at the same place, but with no distinct pale 

 patch] ; the metathorax is also dark, but the plate is narrower dorsally 

 (although wider than in B. sepium) ; the 1st abdominal segment is 

 pale except a chitinous strip at the anterior margin, but the following 

 abdominal segments have a large, square, chitinous (brown) plate 

 (dorsally) on either side, with a serrated darker anterior margin ; these 

 are progressively smaller to the Gth, but that on the 7th is again large, 

 and is followed by the woolly zone ; there are similarly, on the ventral 

 aspect, smaller plates (one on each side) on abdominal segments 2-6. 

 The antenna? are 14-jointed, appear to possess a few scales (though 

 these may have adhered from other parts). The mouth-parts present 

 a conical projection (which one cannot clearly assert to be the labium) 

 with two seta?. The tarsi are 4-jointedon all legs, though actual or com- 

 mencing anchylosis appears to obtain between 3 and 4 on the 1st leg. 

 The scales were described ante, pp. 233-4. Eeaumur describes the female as 

 being almost devoid of wings, but adds that "under a powerful microscope 

 one sees on the segments some thoroughly lepidopterous brown-black 

 scales. These would make the insect dark were it not that there are 

 spaces left between them, and that the segmental incisions are quite 

 naked. The scaleless areas are whitish, so that the insect appears grey 

 to the naked eye. The anus is surrounded by a fringe of yellowish 

 scales, forming a sort of band, these scales being much longer than 

 those on the rest of the body. The legs are brown, corneous, and large 

 for the size of the body ; the head is black or brown, turned ventrally, 



