I xo 
INSECTS . 
by tli 9 m, and the very surf of the lake assumed a more snowy whiteness, due to the 
colour of the hosts of moths drowned in the waters. The woods seemed as 
though visited by a violent snowstorm, so thickly were the insects massed in the 
foliage. In 1852 whole forests were felled, in order if possible to be rid of the 
pest. The trunks were searched for eggs, and every tree-trunk in an area of 
fourteen thousand acres was examined. Often an ounce of eggs would be taken 
from a single tree, and, at the computation of thirty thousand to the ounce, we 
get, at one hundred trees per acre, upwards of thirty hundred million larvge at 
work upon the trees in that area when the eggs hatched. Spotted woodpeckers, 
finches of all kinds, the larva of a longicorn beetle, Clerus, all assisted in the work 
of destruction. Yet, in spite of all this, it needed a hundred labourers with twenty 
foremen to carry out the destruction 
of the young larvae hatched from 
eggs which were overlooked in a 
single acre of forest. The ground 
too, after the season was over, was 
white with the cocoons of countless 
thousands of Ichneumonidce, so that 
millions of the larvae can never, from 
the attacks of these alone, have 
reached maturity. The pale tussock- 
moth (Dcisychira pudibunda) derives 
its trivial name from the tufts or 
tussocks of hair so noticeable a 
feature in the hairy clothing of the 
larvae. The fore-wings are grey with 
a smoky transverse bar. The larva is 
green with a transverse bar of velvet black between the segments from five to eight. 
Each of these segments bears a thick squarely truncated tuft of upright yellow 
hairs, and the last carries a long tail or brush of hair. The species is abundant in 
England and all Europe. In the brown-tail moth ( Porthesia chrysorrhcea ) the 
wings are snowy white, while the body is white with a brown tufted tail in the 
male, which in the female is much larger. The hairs of the tuft are deposited upon 
the eggs as a covering when laid by the female. The larva is short, thick, and 
black, with four rows of spiny tubercles along the sides. It is common in Great 
Britain and also on the Continent. Very similar to the last is the gold-tail 
(.Portliesia auriflua), but the front-wings are dotted with three or more black 
spots, while the tuft at the extremity of the abdomen is formed of golden hairs 
instead of brown. The larva has rows of tubercles along the sides, whence issue 
numerous hair-like bristles. Each of the tubercles of the second row bears tufts of 
white hair. The third row is bright red. A bright vermilion double stripe runs 
along the back, while between the tenth and eleventh segments is a cup-like scarlet 
protuberance. The satin-moth ( Porthesia salicis ) is another well-known member 
of the family, taking its name from the white satiny wings; the antenme and 
thorax being also white, and the body black, clothed with white hairs. The larva 
feeds on the poplar, and is abundant in England and throughout Europe. 
satin moth ( Porthesia salicis ), with larva; and pupa. 
An ichneumon is depositing its eggs in one of the larvae, while 
another is just emerging from the pupa. 
