BPUNDA LUTULENTA. 25 



grass becoming infected with mildew, they both sud- 

 denly died on the 14th January, 1869. I am, however, 

 able to carry on their history, Mr. Terry having kindly 

 forwarded me some of his batch on February 20th; these 

 were then three-eighths of an inch long, of a full green 

 on the back and sides, the ventral surface rather paler. 

 The most noticeable feature at that time was the sub- 

 spiracular stripe being whitish or greenish -white in 

 some, yellowish or of a pale flesh tint in others ; and by 

 the aid of a lens one could see that the dorsal line was of 

 the ground-colour, finely outlined with darker green, 

 and the subdorsal paler green also outlined with darker; 

 also that the ground-colour of the back was delicately 

 freckled over with darker green, the head and an un- 

 freckled plate of green on the second segment, both 

 paler. 



These individuals fed tolerably well for some days 

 on mixed grasses sown in a pot, and they varied their 

 food a little by feeding on some of a miscellaneous 

 collection of plants that had sprung up with the grass, 

 especially on Potentilla fragariastrum, leaving chick- 

 weed and trefoil almost untouched ; however, they 

 had never seemed healthy since their arrival, and they 

 soon began to die off, the longest-lived going about 

 the middle of March. 



Soon after this, I became aware that the Rev. E. 

 Horton had been more successful, and though his 

 stock of young larvae kept out of doors during the 

 winter had been a temptation to robins as choice 

 morsels of food not to be resisted, yet there remained 

 one solitary individual uneaten, which he most kindly 

 entrusted to my care, and on May 8th I had the satis- 

 faction of figuring it. 



This larva was then one inch and one-eighth in 

 length, and moderately stout, of the usual Noctua form; 

 its colour a bright yellowish- green, finely freckled with 

 paler green, the segmental folds showing yellow ; the 

 dorsal stripe of darker green, the subdorsal stripes of 

 very pale rather dull yellowish-green; the spiracles 



