middle, and sometimes kidney-shaped and opaque. These moths commonly fly towards the close of the day, and in the evening twilight. Their eggs are very numerous, amounting to several hundreds from a single individual.

Although the injuries committed by the caterpillars of the Saturnians are by no means very great, the magnitude and beauty of the moths render them very conspicuous and worthy of notice. The largest kinds belong to that division of the Bombyces called Attacus by Linnæus. They are distinguished from the rest of the Saturnians by having wide and flat antennæ, like short oval feathers, in both sexes, and by the fleshy warts on the backs of their caterpillars, which are richly colored, and tipped with minute bristles. Preeminent above all our moths in queenly beauty is the Attacus Luna (Fig. 179), or Luna moth, its specific name being the same as that given by the Romans to the moon, poetically styled "fair empress of the night." The wings of this fine insect are of a delicate light-green color, and the hinder angle of the posterior wings is prolonged, so as to form a tail to each, of an inch and a half or more in length; there is a broad purple-brown stripe along the front edge of the fore wings, extending also across the thorax, and sending backwards a little branch to an eye-like spot near the middle of the wing; these eye-spots, of which there is one on each of the wings, are transparent in the centre, and are encircled by rings of white, red, yellow, and black; the hinder borders of the wings are more or less edged or scalloped with purplebrown; the body is covered with a white kind of wool; the antennæ are ochre-yellow; and the legs are purple-brown. The wings expand from four inches and three quarters to five inches and a half. The caterpillar of this moth lives on the walnut and hickory, on which it may be found, fully grown, towards the end of July and during the month of August. It is of a pale and very clear bluish-green color; there is a yellow stripe on each side of the body, and the back is crossed, between the rings, by transverse lines of

Fig. 179.

THE LUNA MOTH.

the same yellow color; on each of the rings are about six minute pearl-colored warts, tinged with purple or rose-red, and furnishing a few little hairs; and at the extremity of the body are three brown spots, edged above with yellow. When this insect is at rest it is nearly as thick as a man's thumb, its rings are hunched, and its body is shortened, not measuring, even when fully grown, above two inches in length; but, in motion, it extends to the length of three inches or more. When about to make its cocoon, it draws together, with silken threads, two or three leaves of the tree, and

Fig. 180.

within the hollow thus formed spins an oval and very close and strong cocoon (Fig. 180), about one inch and three quarters long, and immediately afterwards changes to a chrysalis. The cocoons fall from the trees in the autumn with the leaves in which they are enveloped; and the moths make their escape from them in June.

A caterpillar, closely resembling that of the Luna moth, may be found on oaks, and sometimes also on elm and lime trees, in August and September. Its sides are not striped with yellow, and there are no transverse yellow bands on the back; the warts have a pearly lustre, more or less tinted with orange, rose-red, or purple, and between the two lowermost on the side of each ring is an oblique white line; the head and the feet are brown; and the tail is bordered by a brown V-shaped line. These caterpillars, in repose, cling to the twigs of the trees, with their backs downwards, contract their bodies in length, and hunch up the rings even more than those of the Luna moth, which, when fully grown, they somewhat exceed in size. They make their cocoons upon the trees in the same manner, with an outer covering of leaves, which fall off in the autumn, bearing the enclosed tough oval cocoons to the ground, where they remain through

THE ATTACUS CECROPIA.

the winter, and the moths come out in the month of June following. Notwithstanding the great similarity of the caterpillar and its cocoon to those of the Luna, the moth is entirely different. Its hind wings are not tailed, but are cut It is of a dull ochre-yeloff almost square at the corners. low color, more or less clouded with black in the middle of the wings, on each of which there is a transparent eye-like spot, divided transversely by a slender line, and encircled by yellow and black rings; before and adjoining to the eyespot of the hind wings is a large blue spot shading into black; near the hinder margin of the wings is a dusky band, edged with reddish white behind; on the front margin of the fore wings is a gray stripe, which also crosses the fore part of the thorax; and near the base of the same wings are two short red lines, edged with white. It expands from five and a quarter to six inches. This moth, on account of its great size, is called Polyphemus (Fig. 181), the name of one of the giants in mythology.

Attacus Cecropia* (Fig. 182) is a still larger insect, expanding from five inches and three quarters to six inches and a half. The hind wings are rounded, and not tailed. The ground-color of the wings is a grizzled dusky brown, with the hinder margins clay-colored; near the middle of each of the wings there is an opaque kidney-shaped dull red spot, having a white centre and a narrow black edging; and beyond the spot a wavy dull red band, bordered internally with white; the fore wings, next to the shoulders, are dull red, with a curved white band; and near the tips of the same is an eye-like black spot, within a bluish-white crescent; the upper side of the body and the legs are dull red; the fore part of the thorax and the hinder edges of the rings of the abdomen are white; and the belly is checkered with red and white. This moth makes its appearance durThe caterpillar (Fig. 183) is ing the month of June.

*Cecropia was the ancient name of the city of Athens; its application, by Linnæus, to this moth is inexplicable.