THE LASIOCAMPIANS. 369 
are four short square brush-like yellow tufts ; the sides are 
dusky and spotted with red ; there arc two long black pencils 
or plumes on the first ring, one on each side of the fifth ring, 
and one on the top of the eleventh ring ; the head is black ; 
and the retractile warts on the top of the ninth and tenth 
rings are red. These caterpillars live on various trees and 
shrubs, and are stated by Miss Dix, in Professor Silliman’s 
“ Journal of Science,” * to have been “ very destructive to 
the thorn hedges in Rhode Island,” “ appearing very early 
in summer, and not disappearing till late in November.” 
The cocoons resemble those of the white-marked vaporer 
( Orgyia leucostigma), and the females, after they have come 
forth, never leave the outside of their cocoons, but lay their 
eggs upon them and die there. 
The next group may be called Lasiocampians (Lasiocam- 
pad.-e), after the principal genus f included in it, the name 
of which signifies hairy caterpillar. The Lasiocampians are 
woolly and very thick-bodied moths, distinguished by the 
want of the bristles and hooks that hold together the fore 
and hind wings of other moths, by the wide and turned-up 
fore edge of the hind wings, which projects beyond that of 
the fore wings when at rest, and hy their caterpillars, which 
(with few exceptions) are not warty on the back, and are 
sparingly clothed with short, soft hairs, mostly placed along 
the sides of the body, and seldom distinctly arranged in 
spreading clusters or tufts. These moths fly only by night, 
and both sexes are winged. Their antennae generally bend 
downwards near the middle, and upwards at the points, arc 
longer than those of the Li parians, but not so widely feath- 
ered in the males, and very narrowly feathered beneath in 
the females. The feelers of some are rather longer than 
common, and are thrust forward like a beak ; but more 
* Vol. XIX. p. 62. 
t To Ldsiocampa belong the European moths called Rubi } Trifolii , Quei'cus, 
Roboris , Dumeti , &c. I have not seen any insects like these in Massachusetts, 
and believe tliat such are seldom if ever to be found in the United States. 
47 
