THE HABITS AND STRUCTURE OF MOTHS. 
XIX 
flies in the very middle of the Lepidoptera, a position which 
has never been assigned to them in any previous work with 
which we are acquainted, except in Zebraw ski’s Catalogue of 
the Lepidoptera of Cracow, and which we do not think will 
ever commend itself to the bulk of entomologists. 
With the exception of the Sphinges and Bombyces, which 
are admittedly heterogeneous groups, we think the main 
sections adopted by Stainton, &c., may be regarded as fairly 
natural. 
Many moths are in the habit of flying over flowers in gar¬ 
dens, meadows, &c., most of them at night, but a few, like the 
Humming-Bird Hawk-Moth (.Macroglossa stellatarum ), the 
Silver Y Moth (Plusia gamma), and various others, fly by 
day. The burnet moths have a booming flight, like bees, from 
flower to flower. Many moths, especially the slender-bodied 
and smaller ones, which hide among grass, heath, shrubs, &c., 
may be easily disturbed during the day; whilst others, in¬ 
cluding many stout-bodied species, are fond of sitting on the 
trunks of trees, and may be found clinging to the bark. 
Towards dusk many moths come out to fly over flowers in 
gardens, &c., retiring on the approach of darkness, to be re¬ 
placed by others (the true night-flyers), which maybe attracted 
by light or by one of the sweet mixtures, known to entomolo¬ 
gists as “sugar.” The Microlepidopteraare best collected on 
summer afternoons. It is then that most species fly. Tree 
trunks, fences, posts, &c., should be examined, and the speci¬ 
mens, when found, caught in pill-boxes. 
Moths are provided with six legs, and have membranous 
wings covered with scales. They undergo a complete meta¬ 
morphosis. From the egg crawls the caterpillar or larva, 
an elongated creature, formed of thirteen segments, the head 
being the first, and having a variable number of legs (usually 
sixteen), which are thus distributed:—the first three pairs 
are placed on segments 2 to 4, and correspond to those of 
the imago or perfect insect; the next four pairs are mem¬ 
branous instead of horny, and are called prolegs—these are 
situated on segments 7 to 10. There is also a pair at the 
extremity of the body, which are called claspers. In the 
larvae of the Geometrse, however, we only find ten legs, the 
first three pairs of prolegs being undeveloped. 
The larva consumes an enormous quantity of food, and 
moults its skin several times. When the old skin becomes 
too tight, owing to the growth of the larva, it splits up the 
back, and the larva emerges clothed in a new skin, which 
has been formed under the old one. 
At length the larva becomes sluggish, ceases to feed, and 
