of the soil at the foot of the same trees during the autumn, winter, and spring months.
The fore wings are ashy grey or greyish brown, marbled with darker tints, with a conspicuous white spot near the centre. The hind wings are similarly coloured except at the base, where there is a large patch of brick-red.
The caterpillar is rough, of a pale green colour dotted with yellow, with seven oblique yellow stripes on each side. The spiracles are white, edged with red; and the horn is yellow on the upper, and reddish on the under side. Its chief food plants are the poplar, the Lombardy poplar (Populus pyramidalis), aspen (P. tremula), and sallow (Salix Caprea and S. cinerea).
The Lime Hawk (Smerinthus Tiliæ)
This beautiful moth (fig. 5, [Plate IX]) is easily identified by its rich olive green and brown wings, the fore pair of which have very conspicuous patches of deep olive, sometimes uniting to form a continuous central bar. It flies in May and June.
The caterpillar is rough, of a pale green colour, dotted with yellow, with seven oblique yellow stripes on each side. Thus it is very like the larva of Populi, but may be distinguished from that species by the orange spiracles, and by the horn, which is rough, blue above, and yellow beneath. Behind the horn, too, there is a flat purple or violet scale with an edging of orange.
The food plants of this species are the lime (Tilia vulgaris), elm (Ulmus campestris), and the hazel (Corylus Avellana), from which the larvæ may be beaten in August and September, and from under these the pupæ may be dug out during the winter months.
The Humming-Bird Hawk (Macroglossa Stellatarum)
The genus to which this insect belongs contains three interesting British species. Their antennæ are thickened toward the end, but terminate in a small curved bristle. Their wings are rather short and broad; their bodies are very thick, terminating in a broad tuft of hair; and the perfect insects fly during the daytime, delighting in the hottest sunshine. The larvæ feed principally on low-growing plants, and undergo their metamorphoses on the ground among the foliage.
On [Plate IX] (fig. 6) one of these pretty moths is shown. It is