298 6rambus inqutnatkllus. 



Cram bus inquinatellus. 

 Plate CLX, fig. 5. 



At the end of April last, 1883, Mr. W. H. B. 

 Fletcher sent me about two dozen larvse of a Crambvs 

 he had found about grass-roots, at Worthing, but the 

 species of which he did not know. I placed them in a 

 pot of growing grass, where they formed slight silken 

 galleries near the roots on the surface of the soil, in 

 which they lived during the day, and apparently 

 coming out and feeding on the grass-stems only at 

 night. During May I lost sight of them, and judged 

 they had all gone below the soil to pupate. Through 

 June and July I anxiously awaited the emergence of 

 the imagos, but, none appearing, I quite gave them up 

 as all dead, and I was, therefore, very agreeably 

 surprised, at quite the end of August and early in 

 September, to breed from them a nice and varied 

 series of G. inquinatellus. 



Larva about three-quarters of an inch in length, 

 and fairly stout in proportion ; the head narrower than 

 the second segment, with the lobes full and rounded, 

 and both it and the frontal plate highly polished. The 

 body cylindrical, and tapering a little towards the 

 extremities ; there is a slight transverse depression on 

 each segment, and these, together with the deeply-cut 

 segmental divisions, give the skin a wrinkled appear- 

 ance. The tubercles are very large and prominent, 

 and are, as well as the whole surface of the body, 

 rather glossy, though not so much so as the head and 

 frontal plate. 



The ground colour varies in different specimens 

 from dull purplish-brown to an equally dingy greyish- 

 green, but the purple-tinted forms predominate; the 

 head is very dark sienna-brown, the depth of colour 

 varying in different specimens; the frontal plate is 

 paler, and partakes more of the colouring of the dorsal 

 surface; the dark pulsating alimentary canal forms the 



