284 CRAMBUS CERUSSELLUS. 



Ckambus CEEUSSELLUS. 

 Plate CLX, fig. 1. 



In the spring of last year, 1883, Mrs. W. H. B. 

 Fletcher found several larvae " under stones" at 

 Worthing which produced Crambus cerussellus ; and 

 this year, 1884, Mr. Fletcher, while at Portland, 

 found numerous similar larvae, some of which he very 

 kindly forwarded to me, which proved to be of the 

 same species. I had several times received batches 

 of the oval, bright, straw-coloured eggs from various 

 friends, but had always failed to rear larvae from 

 them. 



The larvae reached me on the 6th of May, and were 

 feeding on the roots of a short, stiff species of grass. 



They were about half an inch long and rather 

 slender ; the head is highly polished, it has the lobes 

 rounded, and is about the same width as the second 

 segment; the body is cylindrical, and of nearly uni- 

 form width, being attenuated only slightly towards 

 each extremity ; the skin is smooth and rather glossy, 

 and the segmental divisions and the tubercles are well 

 defined. 



The ground colour varies considerably, in some 

 specimens being a pinky flesh-colour, in others 

 greyish-brown, and in some dingy olive-green ; the 

 head also varies in different examples, in some being 

 bright yellowish with brown mandibles, in others 

 yellowish-brown, with the mandibles and the freckles 

 on the lobes still darker brown. There are absolutely 

 no markings beyond a small black spot on each side 

 of the frontal plate, and the tubercles, frontal and. 

 anal plates, and the almost imperceptible spiracles, 

 are of a darker shade of the ground colour. The 

 ventral surface and the prolegs are uniformly of the 

 ground colour of the dorsal area, the anterior legs 

 ringed with a darker shade. (George T. Porritt, 7th 

 August, 1884; E.M.M., September, '"1884, XXI, 86.) 



