This delicate little insect may be often taken at rest on fences and tree-trunks during the day, and is a {92}conspicuous moth when flying in the evening, owing to its light colour. The larva (Fig. 2a), which feeds on the manuka (_Leptospermum ericoides_), is very ornamental. Its general colour is light green, with black dorsal and lateral stripes, and a series of diagonal markings bordered with crimson; the legs and prolegs are also crimson, and the segments are divided by brilliant yellow rings, a white line extending down each side of the larva. It is difficult to find, as it remains closely concealed amongst the dense manuka foliage, from which it can only be dislodged by vigorous and continued beating. The caterpillars allow themselves to fall a short distance, hanging suspended by a silken thread, which they rapidly ascend when the danger is passed. The pupa is rather attenuated, dark-brown, and much pointed at its posterior extremity. It is found buried about an inch in the earth, and the moth appears in a month's time. This insect varies much in intensity of markings. The males are generally considerably darker than the females, but are more certainly distinguished by their attenuated bodies. The pearly white _Asthena pulchraria_ occurs in October and April; it is a most beautiful insect, and may be found amongst the foliage of the kawakawa (_P. excelsum_), on which its larva will probably be found to feed. Family PYRALIDÆ. _Scoparia hemiplaca_ (Plate XII., fig. 4). This pretty little moth was reared from a larva found feeding amongst moss during the winter of 1885, but unfortunately I neglected to make a drawing until it was too late. Doubtless many of the other Pyrales we meet with in the New Zealand forest have similar habits, their larvæ probably feeding on different kinds of mosses. These can always be examined during the winter months, {93}when the entomologist is usually in want of work, and thus much information may be obtained regarding this interesting but little-known family. Family PYRALIDÆ. _Scoparia sabulosella_ (Plate XIII., fig. 4, 4a larva). This is that extremely abundant, though dull-coloured little insect, that rises in such multitudes from every field before one's footsteps during the early summer. Its larva (Fig. 4a) feeds on various mosses, forming numerous silken galleries amongst the roots in which it resides. These caterpillars are very active, and consequently rather difficult to obtain, as they move either backwards or forwards in their galleries with equal rapidity. They feed during the whole of the autumn and winter, changing into pupæ about September, from which the moths emerge in a month or six weeks' time. The habits of the numerous other species belonging to this genus and the closely allied genus _Xeroscopa_ (Meyr) probably do not materially differ from those of the species here described. Family PYRALIDÆ. _Crambus flexuosellus_ (Plate XII., fig. 5).