The puss, it may be remarked, does not depend for protection on the hole of a tree, or the shelter of an overhanging branch, but upon the solidity and strength of the fabric which it rears. The material it commonly uses is the bark of the tree upon which the cell is constructed; but when this cannot be procured, it is contented to employ whatever analogous materials may be within reach. One which we had shut up in a box substituted the marble paper it was lined with for bark, which it could not procure.[BO] With silk it first wove a thin web round the edges of the place which it marked out for its edifice, then it ran several threads in a spare manner from side to side, and from end to end, but very irregularly in point of arrangement; these were intended for the skeleton or framework of the building. When this outline was finished, the next step was to strengthen each thread of silk by adding several (sometimes six or eight) parallel ones, all of which were then glued together into a single thread, by the insect running its mandibles, charged with gluten, along the line. The meshes, or spaces, which were thus widened by the compression of the parallel threads, were immediately filled up with fresh threads, till at length only very small spaces were left. It was in this stage of the operation that the paper came into requisition, small portions of it being gnawed off the box and glued into the meshes. It was not, however, into the meshes only that the bits of paper were inserted; for the whole fabric was in the end thickly studded over with them. In about half a day from the first thread of the framework being spun the building was completed. It was at first, however, rather soft, and yielded to slight pressure with the finger; but as soon as it became thoroughly dry, it was so hard that it could with difficulty be penetrated with the point of a penknife. (J. R.) [One puss-moth larva, which I reared, made its nest in a rather curious manner. After it had ceased feeding it had been placed on a marble mantelpiece under a glass tumbler, as a temporary residence until a more appropriate dwelling could be found for it. But its instincts urged it to make its nest without delay, and it accordingly set to work, and spun itself up in a cocoon composed entirely of its own silk, neither the glass tumbler or the mantelpiece affording it any material with which to harden the walls of its dwelling. [Illustration: Cell built by the Larva of the Puss-Moth.]