108 BRITISH BUTTERFLIES. 



nervures appear also to go with the large form. We suspect the 

 species varies much more than is generally supposed. 



Egglaying. — Eggs laid in a row in a folded grass blade about July 

 29th, 1865, the larvae appeared on August 12th (Hellins)'. Hawes 

 asserts (Ent., xxv., p. 177) that the eggs do not hatch until the 

 following spring. 



Ovum. — The egg has all the appearance of a flat egg, having three 

 axes of different lengths ; in reality, it is an upright egg of this 

 peculiar form, the micropylar axis being perpendicular to the surface 

 on which the egg is laid, i.e., the micropyle is on the top of the egg. It 

 is of a pale yellow colour (in an egg dissected from a ? ), the base and top 

 rather flattened, with the edges smoothly rounded and rather rimmed 

 around the upper surface. The surface has a granulated appearance 

 and there is a faint, irregular, cellular surface reticulation. The 

 micropyle is placed in a slight central depression of the upper surface, 

 has, in the eggs examined, 7 canals (?), surrounded by a rosette of 10 

 rather pointed cells, the latter being again surrounded by numerous 

 larger elongated cells with rounded ends. The measurements are : — 

 height ( = micropylar axis) 0-4mm., length 0'9mm., width 0-7mm., 

 the micropylar area being about O'lmm. in diameter. In superficial 

 appearance the outline of the egg bears some resemblance to that of 

 a miniature egg oi Amorpha populi. [Sich. Described, July 22nd, 1905, 

 from a fully-developed egg dissected from the body of a £ •] Not at 

 all like that of Augiades sylvan us, being considerably smaller, of a long 

 oval figure, half as long again as wide, the shell glistening, devoid of 

 ribs or reticulation ; at first white, then turning dull yellowish, and at 

 last paler again with the dark head of the larva showing through 

 (Hellins). 



Habits of larva. — The larvae leave the egg in August (12th, 1865 

 and 15th, 1876, teste Hellins), and feed very little before hybernation, 

 spinning almost as soon as hatched little ropes of silk across the 

 blades of grass, and making little web coverings for themselves. A 

 larva kept until the middle of November was only about 2mm. in length. 

 Freyer, however, says (Next. Beit.) that the larvae are of good size in 

 August and September in woods where there are brambles and tall 

 grass, that it hybernates, and is fullgrown in May. [This remark 

 only shows the necessity of working out the lifehistory ab two.] 

 After hybernation, and when nearly fullgrown in early June, they 

 may be swept in the evening from Holcus lanatus, a very soft 

 pubescent grass, with which they assimilate both in colour and 

 texture remarkably well. They continue to feed on this grass, Brachy- 

 podium sylvaticum, etc., till towards the end of June, their movements 

 being very sluggish, and, after eating a considerable quantity of food, 

 they enclose themselves within spun-together leaves of grass for 

 pupation. Larvae are noted as having been found in nature as 

 follows:— July 17th, Ib69, fullfed larva at Painswick Hill (Watkins); 

 one found on grass in a chalk-pit on South Downs near Steyning, 

 June 29th, 190)5, which spun up first week in July, and imago emerged 

 'July 19th (Bird); Larvae as late as August 27th, 1902, at Burgess 

 Hill, a, very late season (Dollman). 



Larva. — J''i>uil instar : The full grown larva is 21mm. in length 

 its general figure of moderate substances stoutest ID the middle of the 

 body, tapering a little from the thoracic segments towards the head, 



