SATURN IIDJE. 
479 
green, the forewing having a dark pink fore edge ; in each wing is a buff 
and red spot. The larva is green with yellow tubercles bearing spines. 
The species is widely spread over the hill forest areas in India, at low 
elevations often, but is typically a subtropical and only occasionally a 
plains species (e.g., in Chota Nagpur). 
Attacus atlas, Linn. (The Atlas Moth), is the largest Indian Moth, 
a very beautiful vividly coloured ^insect found in hilly forest districts. 
Its life-history is described by (Entomologist XII, p. 25) and an 
account of it occurs in Hardiman’s “ Silk in Burmah. ” Attacus 
cynthia, Dr., is stated to be the eri silk of Assam, as also is Attacus ricini, 
Boisd., the two differing only in colouring and very slightly in markings. 
Moths reared from true eri cocoons cultivated in Assam proved to be 
the latter (Plate XLIY). The lifehistory has been fully described 
elsewhere and there is a literature on this insect. Like others of this 
family it is wholly dependent upon moist conditions; the larvae exhibit 
a curious variation, some being green, some white, some being spotted 
with black, others not; the cocoons are white or brick-red but selection 
fixes the latter, while it does not influence the larval colour or spotting. 
Anthercea includes the tasar silk moth (A. paphia, Linn.) and the 
muga silk moth (A. Assama, Westw.). The former makes a cocoon 
usually of the form shown, fastened by a stalk, the latter a simpler oval 
cocoon. Tasar is collected in many forest areas in India and is a very 
important industry, muga is semi-cultivated in Assam, and forms the 
basis of an industry there. 
The tasar silkworm (Plates XLII, XLIII) is not a domesticated 
insect at all, it feeds upon trees or bushes in the open entirely and the^. 
sources of silk are either of purely wild cocoons collected by cow-herds 
when the trees are leafless and they can be seen, or cocoons formed on 
special trees by worms which were hatched on that tree from eggs laid in 
captivity, the rearer having kept cocoons till the moths emerged. In 
this species, the females alone are kept, the males are allowed to fly away 
and mating takes place at dusk with any male that comes. There are 
in tusser a number of varieties or races, some two-brooded, some one- 
brooded; the entire absence of any control over this mating, so far as 
the male is concerned, is probably one cause of the degeneration of the 
tasar industry, since a female of a race that spins good marketable 
