34 BRITISH BUTTERFLIES. 



the larva constructs its hybernaculum after its second or third moult, 

 rolling a piece of leaf into a cylinder, which is fastened by its large axis 

 flat upon a twig. Dorfmeister adds to this crude description the fact that 

 some larva? observed continued to feed for a week or two, after they 

 had taken up their winter residences, each returning to its own after 

 every meal. Of a third European species, Neptis aceris, Gartner 

 observes (Stett. Ent. Ztg., xxi., pp. 296-7) that, after the third moult, 

 the larva of this species constructs its hybernaculum of a partly-eaten 

 leaf of its foodplant, which is attached by silken threads to the twig to 

 which it belongs. His general remarks on the larval habits just 

 previous to hybernation suggest, however, considerable difference from 

 those of the preceding species. 



The Nearctic species of Basilarchia are very closely allied in their 

 larval habits to our European Limenitis sibylla and Najas populi. 

 Sufficiently exact observations have not been made for absolute 

 certainty, but Edwards states that all the American Limenitids appear 

 to hybernate after the second or third moult. Edwards further notes 

 (Can. Ent., xvi.,p. 87) that the larva of Basilarchia archippus {Limenitis 

 disippus) and those of the allied species spend the winter in cases 

 cut out of the leaves of their foodplants, one larva to one case, and 

 fitted as neatly as a tailor would fit a coat to his customer. Scudder, 

 summarising the observations of Walsh, Riley, and Edwards, notes of 

 Basilarchia archippus, that the hybernaculum is made of a willow- 

 leaf. The larva eats the side of the leaf nearly to the midrib, for about 

 one-third the distance from the tip, ordinarily selecting for the purpose 

 a leaf near the end of a twig ; it brings together the opposite edges of 

 the leaf, and not only fastens them firmly with silk, but covers this 

 nest outside and inside with a carpet of light brown glossy silk, so that 

 the leaf is nearly hidden ; it also travels back and forth on the leaf- 

 stalk and around the twig, spinning silk as it goes, until the leaf is 

 firmly attached to the stalk, and, in spite of the frost and wind, it 

 hangs until the spring. Following the projecting midrib, the cater- 

 pillar creeps into the cell headforemost, closing the opening with its 

 hinder segments all abristle with spines and warts. For its hybernacu- 

 lum, the allied B. arthemis selects a growing leaf of birch, eats away the 

 apical third or fourth, excepting the midrib and a narrow flange on 

 each side of it, or it uses the leaf it has been eating, already trimmed 

 in this fashion ; it then draws together, above, the outer edges of the 

 uneaten portion to construct a tube, which it lines very heavily with 

 brown silk, within and without, and further binds the leaf -stalk to the 

 stem with repeated bindings of silk, to prevent its falling to the ground 

 in winter ; by means of the ledge formed by the projecting midrib, it 

 then enters the tube head foremost, and completely fills it, so that the 

 opening is just closed by the roughened end of the body. The resemb- 

 lance that the hybernacula of this species bear to the opening buds 

 and curving terminal shoots of the twigs on which they occur, is very 

 striking; the colour of the soft down of the buds and the enveloping 

 silk of the hybernacula are as similar as their forms, and this mimetic 

 resemblance is, doubtless, as effective as it is interesting. Of the hyber- 

 nacula of the larvae of the southern Basilarchia eros, Edwards notes that 

 they are constructed apparently after the second moult, possibly from the 

 leaf upon which the larva commenced its existence, whether willow or 

 aspen, as in the case with B. archippus (disippus). The ends of the 



