•J 109 
3TES ON THE EARLIER STAGES OF SOME SPECIES OF LITHOSID£. 
BY THE RET. JOH>- HELLI>'S, M.A. 
The lichen-feeding LitTiosidce are generally so troublesome to 
anage, that I feel a sort of satisfaction in announcing that I have this 
mmer succeeded in obtaining the imago of four out of the five species, 
lose eggs last year came into my care. Not that I have very much 
boast of, for although in the case of griseola I believe I stumbled upon 
16 at least of its natural pabula, and so kept alive nearly twenty larvfe ; 
the other species it was but a scanty remnant that appeared in the 
nged state, and mesomella perished before half grown. 
LitTiosia molyhdeola (Grn.), serkea (Gregson). Mr. Doubleday 
38t kindly transmitted to me some eggs he had received of this species, 
d by the time the parcel reached me (July 2(}th, 1S67,) the young 
•vae had appeared. Most of the brood must have soon perished, but 
e three which lived till September were then about half-an-inch long ; 
d the two final survivors spun up before the end of ^lay, and appeared 
moths on July 3rd and 4th, 1S6S. 
I could never see that they ate any food I gave them freely ; but 
diiferent times I saw that they had eaten a little of various lichens 
>m trees or banks, wall moss, withered sallow and oak leaves, slices of 
pnip and carrot, and knot grass, and they must have thriven as well 
they would have if they had been at large, for the two bred moths 
re not at all smaller than captured specimens.* 
I noticed, not in this species only, but in all the Litliosidce larvre I 
3, that the characteristic markings and tints were assumed very early 
Long before they had attained a quarter of their growth. 
When full-grown this larva is rather more than three quarters of 
inch in length ; moderately stout, uniform in bulk ; head very hard 
1 shining ; all the tubercles crowned with tufts of short hairs, mixed 
;h a few longer ones ; of the dorsal tubercles the front pair are small, 
i the hinder pair very large. 
The ground colour, when seen between the tufts of hair, i.s a dead 
ckish-grey ; but the segmental folds are black ; there is a rich vel- 
y, very black, dorsal stripe ; the sub- dorsal line, being broken on 
h segment by the hinder tubercle with its tuft of hair, must be 
her called a row of elongated particoloured spots, each beginning on 
: hinder part of a segment, and continued across the fold into the 
d segment, until stopped by the tubercle ; the colours being white 
* I trust, from what Mr. Doubleday tells me, that Mr. Greening has now a clue to the right food. 
