KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL, 



349 



noxious insects, which are alike destructive 

 to the garden and field crops. When nursing 

 its young family, the quantity of these 

 which it carries to its nest in one day almost 

 exceeds belief. It is therefore our interest 

 to encourage this beautiful, this interesting 

 bird, by every means in our power. — 

 May 20, 1852. 



THE DEATH'S-HEAD MOTH. 



The Death's-Head Sphinx, or Moth, is 

 the largest and most remarkable of its 

 genus, and the most elegant of all its- Euro ■ 

 pean congeners. The caterpillar from which 

 this curious moth proceeds, is in the highest 

 degree beautiful, and far surpasses in size 

 every other European insect of the kind, 

 measuring sometimes nearly five inches in 

 length, and being of a considerable thick- 

 ness. Its color is bright yellow, and the 

 sides are marked by a row of seven elegant 

 broad stripes, or bands of a vivid violet and 

 of a sky-blue color. The tops of these bands 

 meet on the back in so many angles, and are 

 varied in that part with jet-black specks. 

 On the last joint of the body is a kind of 

 horn ; not in an erect position, but hanging 

 over the joint like a tail. It has a rough 

 surface, and is of a yellow color. 



This caterpillar is usually found on the 

 potatoe and jessamine, those plants being its 

 favorite food. It usually changes into a 

 chrysalis in the month of September, retiring 

 for that purpose pretty deep under the earth, 

 the complete insect emerging in the following 

 June or July. But some individuals are ob- 

 served to change into a chrysalis in July or 

 August, and these produce the complete 

 insect in November ; so that there appear to 

 be two broods or annual races. 



The upper wings of the Death's-Head 

 Moth are of a fine dark-grey color, with a 

 few variations of yellow and orange, and 

 sometimes, but rarely, white clouds. The 

 under wings are of a bright orange color, 

 marked by a pair of transverse black bars, 

 white about the top of the back. On the 

 top of the throat is a very large patch of a 

 most singular appearance, exactly resembling 

 the usual figure of a skull, or death's-head, 

 and of a pale grey, veined with dark ochre 

 and black. — Brown's Booh of Butterflies. 



The Death's-Head Moth is generally con- 

 sidered a very rare insect ; and as the ca- 

 terpillar feeds chiefly by night (concealing 

 itself during the day under leaves, &c), it is 

 not often detected. Yet, from singular cir- 

 cumstances favorable to its breed, there are 

 some seasons in which it is even plentiful. 

 It is a great enemy to bees, and Huber has 

 occupied a chapter in his celebrated work on 

 Bees, with a very interesting description of 



the ravages of this moth, which he calls " A 

 New Enemy of Bees." 



Mr. Leonard Knapp, in his entertaining 

 Journal of a Naturalist, devotes a few pages 

 to the economy of the Death's-Head Moth, 

 as he observed it in his neighborhood in the 

 West of England. He remarks : " Our 

 extensive cultivation of the potatoe furnishes 

 us annually with several specimens of this 

 fine animal, the Death's-Head Moth ; and in 

 some years I have had as many as eight 

 brought me in the larva, or chrysalis state. 

 Their changes are very uncertain. I have 

 had the larva change to a chrysalis in July, 

 and produce the moth in October ; but gene- 

 rally the aurelia remains unchanged until 

 the ensuing summer. The larvae, or cater- 

 pillars, ' strong, ungainly beasts,' as some of 

 our peasantry call them, excite constant at- 

 tention when seen, by their extraordinary 

 size and uncommon mien. They have horns 

 and tails not unusually five inches in length, 

 and as thick as a finger ! This creature was 

 formerly considered as one of our rarest 

 insects, and it was doubtful if truly indi- 

 genous ; but for the last twenty years, from 

 the profuse cultivation of the potatoe, it has 

 become not very uncommon in divers places. 

 Superstition has been particularly active in 

 suggesting causes of alarm from the insect 

 world ; and where man should have seen only 

 beauty and wisdom, he has often found terror 

 and dismay. The yellow and brown-tailed 

 moths, the death-watch, snails, and many 

 others, have all been the subjects of his fears ; 

 but the dread excited in England by the ap- 

 pearance, noises, or increase of insects, are 

 of petty pretensions when compared with 

 the horror that the presence of this acherontia 

 occasions to some of the more fanciful and 

 superstitious natives of northern Europe, who 

 maintain the wildest conception. A letter 

 is [now before me from a correspondent in 

 German Poland, where this insect is a com- 

 mon creature ; and so abounded in 1824, that 

 my informant collected fifty of them in the 

 potatoe fields of his village, where they call 

 them the ' Death's-Head Phantom,' the 

 ' Wandering Death's Head,' &c. 



" In Germany, as in England, they were first 

 observed on the jessamine, but now ex- 

 clusively upon the potatoe, though they will 

 enter the bee-hives to feed on the honey 

 found in them. This insect is thought to be 

 peculiarly gifted in having a voice, and 

 squeaking like a mouse when handled or dis- 

 turbed ; but in truth, no insect that we know 

 of has the requisite organs to produce a 

 genuine voice. They emit sounds by other 

 means, probably all external. The grass- 

 hopper and the cricket race effect their well- 

 known, and often wearisome chirpings, by 

 grating their spiny thighs against their rigid 

 wings ; and this Death's-Head Moth appears 



