58 SPHINGIDiE. 



molested throws the head and anterior segments of the body 

 from side to side, at the same time 1 making a rapidly repeated 

 clicking noise, which appears to be produced by the mandibles. 

 When ready to pupate it stops feeding for some days, and 

 the dorsum becomes suffused with purplish (in the green 

 form) or brown (in the grey and yellow forms). It then 

 leaves the food-plant and hurries along the ground in search 

 of a suitable place to burrow in the earth, moving with a 

 quick undulatory motion. The prolegs and claspers lose 

 most of their prehensile powers during this period. On finding 

 a suitable place it pushes its head into the earth, buries 

 itself in a few minutes, and makes an ovoid cell about 6 inches 

 under the surface and about 80 mm. long by 40 mm. broad, 

 the inside smooth but not lined with silk. The pupa is 

 rather sluggish. The moth rests with the wings folded pent- 

 house-wise, covering the abdomen completely. When dis- 

 turbed it raises the body from the surface on which it is 

 sitting, at the same time partially opening and raising the wings, 

 and emitting a squeaking note. Mell states that this moth 

 enters bee-hives to steal the honey, as in the case of the 

 English Death's-head Hawk-Moth. It comes to light freely. 



2. Acherontia styx styx Westw. (Fig. 9 C, imago, L>, E, 

 genitalia ; PL VIII, figs. 1, 2, larva). 



Sphinx {Acherontia) styx, Westwood, 1848, p. 88, pi. xlii, fig. 3 

 (E. Indies). 



Acherontia styx, Moore, 1865, p. 793 (Bengal) ; id., 1882, p. 7, 

 pi. lxxvi, figs. 1, la, b, c (1., p.. i.) ; Swinhoe, 1885 A, p. 290 

 (Poona, Bombay ; 1. sound, colour variable aec. to food) ; id., 

 1886, p. 435 (Mhow) ; id., 1888, p. 119 (Karachi); Warren, 

 1888, p. 293 (Campbellpore) ; Hampson. 1892, p. 67, fig. 40 (6*) ; 

 Dudgeon, 1898. p. 406 (Sikkim ; Bhutan ; up to 6,000 ft.) ; Nurse, 

 1899, p. 513 (Cutch). 



Manduca styx, Kirby, 1892, p. 700. 



Acherontia styx styx, Roths. & Jord., 1903, p. 23 ; Jordan, 1911, 

 p. 232; Seitz, 1928, p. 527, t. 60 a; Scott, 1931, pi. ii, fig. 1 

 (larva). 



Im,ago. — $Q. Distinguished from lachesis by basal third 

 of hind wing upperside being immaculate instead of marked 

 with black, the skull-mark being less conspicuous and the 

 yellow side-patches being more extensive. Fore wing upper- 

 side with tawny-russet streaks and a patch of the same colour 

 beyond the greyish- white discal lines. Antenna much more 

 slender and longer in both sexes than in specimens of atropos 

 of the same size ; the middle segments in the $ barely three 

 times as high as long. Anterior tibia longer than in atropos, 

 first segment more slender and, like the other segments, 

 with fewer spines than in either atropos or lachesis ; the lateral 

 apical spines prolonged ; the number of spines individually 

 variable as in the other species ; middle tibia as long as the 



