45 
are very fond of moisture, and that when changing the food they go to 
the end that has been in the water and drink the moisture, hut I should 
say that habit was not confined to S. jagi only, as I have noticed 
various larvse do the same when kept in confinement. The favourite 
food in nature is undoubtedly beech, but the lame have been beaten 
from oak, birch and nut. Last year Mr. Burrows had one brought to 
him which had been found feeding on whitethorn, from quite near the 
town of Brentford. St. John gives apple as a food-plant, and in confine¬ 
ment they will eat maple and sycamore. In beech woods they may be 
found by diligently searching the lower branches. 
The probable method of pupation would be among the dry leaves 
of the beech which lie so thickly in any hollows under the trees. 
Newman says that the larva spins the leaves of the oak together to 
pupate in, and that when the leaves fall from the tree they form a 
kind of parachute to convey the pupa to the ground without any 
damage. My own opinion is that the larva finds its way down the tree 
before pupating, as they evince all those wandering habits which are so 
general in most larvae before they spin up, and they have been found 
by Mr. Holland in the beech woods at Reading on the ground in search 
of a suitable place in which to pupate. It is true they are very fond 
of spinning the leaves together, and when bred in confinement I have 
usually placed the larvae which are ready to spin in small boxes with 
plenty of leaves, and they more often than not prefer to form their 
cocoon with a leaf top and bottom. 
The substance of which the cocoon is formed of is more in the 
nature of a gum than of silk, for when the leaf is removed which forms 
the outer covering, all the veins of the leaf are represented on the sub¬ 
stance of the cocoon, as shown in one or two examples which I have 
exhibited. 
In rearing S. fagi I have always found by far the heaviest losses 
occur in the pupa stage. The larvae as a rule feed up without any 
trouble, provided that they are allowed to have their first meal of egg¬ 
shell ; but the pupae have a way of drying up when the moth is fully 
formed, and I have not yet been able to find a really successful 
way of treating them. Out of a brood of rather over twenty I bred 
five moths, one of which was a cripple, and on opening the remaining 
pupae, I found they had dried up with the fully formed moths inside. 
In one or two cases the front of the pupa was a little cracked, from 
which it would appear that the moth had made efforts to emerge but 
was not successful. Another time I had a brood of about the same 
number, and in this case the larvae were evidently bent on getting out 
the same year, as they grew very rapidly and did not attain quite the 
same size as my previous lot. These all emerged in August and it was 
a most successful brood. As they were so short a time in the pupa, I 
imagine they had not had time to dry up. I believe it is no uncommon 
thing for part of a brood to emerge in August and part to come out 
the following spring, but I have not had that occur with any of my 
broods. 
There is no doubt that the species is nowhere more abundant than 
in the large beech woods near Reading, Marlow, and other places along 
the ridges in the Thames Valley; but away from beech woods it would 
be considered rare. Epping Forest is another favourite locality, and I 
have taken it at Brentwood, in Essex, and Mr. Studd tells me he takes 
