Page:Jardine Naturalist's Library Exotic Moths.djvu/188

152 Byer, but because they have greater plenty of Asseen than Byer, and, moreover, trim and dress out plots of Asseen on purpose for the worms. The principal difference between the above two species is, that the natives retain a part of the Jarroo cocoons for seed; these they hang out on the Asseen trees when the proper season of the moth arrives; when the moths come out, the male insects invariably all fly away, but the females remain on the trees. These are not impregnated by the males bred along with them, but, in ten or twelve hours, or perhaps one, two, or three days, a flight of males arrive, settle on the branches, and impregnate the females; by the bye, the hill people calculate good or ill fortune in proportion to the speedy or tardy arrival of the stranger males. These insects die as soon as the purposes of Nature are effected, and the females live only to produce the eggs on the branches of the trees, and then expire. In regard to the Bughy species, they all take flight, females as well as males, and hence the natives firmly believe that they are all males, though I cannot see any physical reason for supposing them so. I have frequently endeavoured to detain the males of the Jarroo species, and have kept them locked up in a box for that purpose; but whether they did not like to make free with their female relations, or from what other cause I know not, but I never could obtain a breed in the domestic state, and the efforts of the male to escape were wonderful, and at last always effectual. The accounts given by the natives of the distance to