APLEOTA OCCULTA. 43 



comes the broad stripe of conspicuously bright yellow- 

 ish-white, narrower on the second segment, and widen- 

 ing gradually to the fifth, suffused in the middle 

 of each wth a tinge of orange or of pink, and having 

 a chain-like series of blackish and grey freckles run- 

 ning through its middle ; the belly and legs of the 

 ground-colour are generally much paler than the back, 

 but freckled with black at the sides, more sparingly 

 towards the middle. 



Among the larvse sent me by Mr. Blackburn some 

 beautiful varieties were developed. Directly after their 

 last moult they seemed to be quite black and velvety, 

 but with a brilliant subspiracular whitish stripe ; as the 

 skin became more expanded by their increasing growth, 

 the ground-colour began to appear by degrees on the 

 back and sides, in the interstices of the black freckles, of 

 a cool grey tinged with a rosy hue, and banded across 

 the front of the segments with a suffusion of blackish- 

 brown. Those that hibernated and moulted in the 

 spring, and attained to half and three parts growth, 

 were differently coloured from any of the others, for, 

 although the details of markings were similar, the 

 ground-colours were rich, warm, bronzy-browns. 



The pupa of A. occulta is nearly one inch in length, 

 stout in proportion, of the usual Noctua form, the tail 

 ending in two small points a little divergent ; the 

 surface roughened by minute pits and striations, 

 except at the divisions of the abdominal rings. In 

 the newly-changed pupa these were flesh-colour, but 

 after a few days became dark red, and soon after 

 turned like the colour of the rest of the surface, a 

 blackish-purple ; through these parts the wings and 

 antennas cases still have the purple rather redder than 

 the rest; the spiracles blackish. (W. B., 15th June, 

 1875; E.M.M., August, 1875, XII, 66.) 



