The caterpillar is brownish grey covered with yellowish brown hairs arising from greyish-ringed pale brown warts; a paler line along the middle of the back, and some white dots forming a broken line below the black outlined spiracles. Head pale chestnut brown, glossy. When newly hatched it is whitish, tinged with yellow and semi-transparent; the dots and hairs are dark grey. After the first moult the colour is greyish with black dots and blackish hairs. Head yellowish, brown tinged. It feeds in July, sometimes earlier, and August, and seems to thrive on the foliage of many kinds of low-growing plants, such as dandelion, dock, plantain, chickweed, etc., and also eats the leaves of birch and rose. Chrysalis, very dark brown, almost black, glossy, but minutely pitted, giving a roughened appearance; enclosed in a close fitting cocoon composed of silk and the caterpillar's hairs, with particles of earth on the outside (Plate 79). The moth flies at night, and except that a female may occasionally be seen on the wing, this species is rarely observed in the daytime. May and June are the usual months for this moth, but in 1906 a specimen was attracted to light on November 3. [Illustration] Pl. 78. 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7. MUSLIN MOTH _varieties_. 5. WHITE ERMINE, _var. walkeri_. [Illustration] Pl. 79. MUSLIN MOTH. _Eggs, natural size and enlarged; caterpillar, chrysalis and cocoon._ {155} Widely distributed, and often common in most English counties, in parts of Wales, and in Scotland as far north at least as Ross. In Ireland one male specimen of the typical form has been obtained in Co. Galway, and one in Co. Clare; var. _rustica_ occurs in Co. Dublin, and Kings Co., Waterford, Cork, Kerry, and Galway. THE RUBY TIGER (_Phragmatobia fuliginosa_).