iSgi] THE BRITISH NATURALIST. 



interior portion of the feather is white, with numerous black dots " 

 (''Entomologist's Monthly Magazine," Vol. XXV., p. 431.) 



Larva — The following description by Mr. Buckler, was published 

 by Mr. C. G. Barrett in the " Entomologist's Monthly Magazine," Vol. 

 VIII., p. 155: — "The full-grown larva is five lines in length, 

 cylindrical, tapering a little behind, and a little in front from the 

 second segment to the head, which is a trifle smaller and rounded ; 

 the segments appear very plump from the divisions being deeply 

 cut ; it is a pale glaucous-green colour, with dorsal and sub-dorsal 

 lines of dull green ; the tubercules are brown, bearing fascicles of 

 numerous white hairs, those on the thoracic segments very spreading, 

 and it is altogether very hairy." . 



Of the life history of the larva, Mr. Barrett also writes: — " The 

 mode of the life of this larva is sufficiently curious. It gnaws a deep 

 round hole in the side of the stem of a young shoot of Teticvium 

 scorodonia, stopping the flow of sap and causing it to droop, then crawls 

 (slowly enough) to the heart and eats portions of the younger leaves, 

 biting them through like ordinary larva, and never, I believe, gnawing 

 the surface of the leaf like some of its congeners, nor entering the shoot 

 like others. It does not confine itself to one shoot, but, after eating 

 bits of several leaves, goes to another, which it causes to droop in the 

 same way. In wet weather the shoots will recover and raise, but if 

 the sun is hot and weather dry, they wither, and serve (like the shoots 

 of spindle when mined by the larvae of Hyponomeuta plmnbella) as 

 signal flags to show where a larva is to be found. In confinement, the 

 larva makes no attemp to wither the shoot, but eats the young and 

 full-grown leaves indifferently. Its principal object is, evidently, shelter 

 from the sun, and it is so sluggish that it can hardly ever be seen to 

 move when light is upon it. It is liable to a queer disease, which 

 causes it to become distended, and die in the form of a little hairy 

 bladder. Great numbers die in this way, and from some of them 

 ichneumons emerge, but I think by no means from all." In th-^ 

 " Entomologist's Monthly Magazine," Vol. IV., p. 16, Mr. Greening 

 writes : — " The larvae teed on Teiicriinn scorodonia, and are now (May 

 2nd) just changing their first skins ; they do not feed down the stems 

 of their food-plant like some of the other " plumes " but eat the young 

 leaves first."' Again, on p. 39, he writes : — " When I first found the 



