On learning all I could acquire by experience with these moths, and what the books had to teach, I became their warm admirer. One sunny morning climbing the hill on the way to the cardinals, with fresh plates in my cameras, and high hopes in my heart, I passed an unsually large fine thistle, with half a dozen Thysbe moths fluttering over it as if nearly crazed with fragrance, or honey they were sipping.
"Come here! Come here! Come here!" intoned the cardinal, from the sycamore of Rainbow Bottom.
"Just you wait a second, old fellow!" I heard myself answering. Scarcely realizing what I was doing, the tripod was set up, the best camera taken out, and focused on that thistle head. The moths paid no attention to bees, butterflies, or humming-birds visiting the thistle, but this was too formidable, and by the time the choicest heads were in focus, all the little red fellows had darted to another plant. If the camera was moved there, they would change again, so I sat in the shade of a clump of papaws to wait and see if they would not grow accustomed to it.
They kept me longer than I had expected, and the chances are I would have answered the cardinal's call, and gone to the river, had it not been for the interest found in watching a beautiful grey squirrel that homed in an ivy-covered stump in the pasture. He seemed to have much business on the fence at the hilltop, and raced back and forth to it repeatedly. He carried something, I could not always tell what, but at times it was green haws. Once he came with no food, and at such a headlong run that he almost turned somersaults as he scampered up the tree.
For a long time he was quiet, then he cautiously peeped out. After a while he ventured to the ground, raced to a dead stump, and sitting on it, barked and scolded with all his might. Then he darted home again. When he had repeated this performance several times, the idea became apparent. There was some danger to be defied in Rainbow Bottom, but not a sound must be made from his home. The bark of a dog hurried me to the fence in time to see some hunters passing in the bottom, but I thanked mercy they were on the opposite side of the river and it was not probable they would wade, so my birds would not be disturbed. When the squirrel felt that he must bark and chatter, or burst with tense emotions, he discreetly left his mate and nest. I did some serious thinking on the 'instinct' question. He might choose a hollow log for his home by instinct, or eat certain foods because hunger urged him, but could instinct teach him not to make a sound where his young family lay? Without a doubt, for this same reason, the cardinal sang from every tree and bush around Horseshoe Bend, save the sumac where his mate hovered their young.
The matter presented itself in this way. The squirrel has feet, and he runs with them. He has teeth, and he eats with them. He has lungs, and he breathes with them. Every organ of his interior has its purpose, and is used to fulfil it. His big, prominent eyes come from long residence in dark hollows. His bushy tail helps him in long jumps from tree to tree. Every part of his anatomy is created, designed and used to serve some purpose, save only his brain, the most complex and complicated part of him. Its only use and purpose is to form one small 'tidbit' for the palate of the epicure! Like Sir Francis, who preached a sermon to the birds, I found me delivering myself of a lecture to the squirrels, birds, and moths of Sunshine Hill. The final summing up was, that the squirrel used his feet, teeth, eyes and tail; that could be seen easily, and by his actions it could be seen just as clearly that he used his brain also.
There was not a Thysbe in front of the lens, so picking up a long cudgel I always carry afield, and going quietly to surrounding thistles, I jarred them lightly with it, and began rounding up the Hemaris family in the direction of the camera. The trick was a complete success. Soon I had an exposure on two. After they had faced the camera once, and experienced no injury, like the birds, they accepted it as part of the landscape. The work was so fascinating, and the pictures on the ground glass so worth while, that before I realized what I was doing, half a dozen large plates were gone, and for this reason, work with the cardinals that day ended at noon. This is why I feel that at times in bird work the moths literally 'thrust themselves' upon me.
CHAPTER XIII The Modest Moth: Triptogon Modesta
Of course this moth was named Modesta because of modest colouring.
It reminds me of a dove, being one of my prime favourites. On wing
it is suggestive of Polyphemus, but its colours are lighter and softer.
Great beauty that Polyphemus is, Modesta equals it.
Modesta belongs to the genus Triptogon, species Modesta—hence the common name, the Modest moth. I am told that in the east this moth is of stronger colouring than in the central and western states. I do not know about the centre and west, but I do know that only as far east as Indiana, Modesta is of more delicate colouring than it is described by scientists of New York and Pennsylvania; and, of course, as in almost every case, the female is not so strongly coloured as the male.
I can class the Modest moth and its caterpillar among those I know, but my acquaintance with it is more limited than with almost any other. My first introduction came when I found a caterpillar of striking appearance on water sprouts growing around a poplar stump in a stretch of trees beside the Wabash. I carried it home with a supply of the leaves for diet, but as a matter of luck, it had finished eating, and was ready to pupate. I write of this as good luck, because the poplar tree is almost extinct in my location. I know of only one in the fields, those beside the river, and a few used for ornamental shade trees. They are so scarce I would have had trouble to provide the caterpillar with natural food; so I was glad that it was ready to pupate when found.
Any one can identify this caterpillar easily, as it is most peculiar. There is a purplish pink cast on the head and mouth of the full-grown caterpillar, and purplish red around the props. The body is a very light blue-green, faintly tinged with white, and yellow in places. On the sides are white obliques, or white, shaded with pink, and at the base of these, a small oval marking. There is a small short horn on the head. But the distinguishing mark is a mass of little white granules, scattered all over the caterpillar. It is so peppered with these, that failure to identify it is impossible.
These caterpillars pupate in the ground. I knew that, but this was before I had learned that the caterpillar worked out a hole in the ground, and the pupa case only touched the earth upon which it lay. So when my Modesta caterpillar ceased crawling, lay quietly, turned dark, shrank one half in length, and finally burst the dead skin, and emerged in a shining dark brown pupa case two inches long, I got in my work. I did well. A spade full of garden soil was thoroughly sifted, baked in the oven to kill parasites and insects, cooled, and put in a box, and the pupa case buried in it. Every time it rained, I opened the box, and moistened the earth. Two months after time for emergence, I dug out the pupa case to find it white with mould. I had no idea what the trouble was, for I had done much work over that case, and the whole winter tended it solicitously. It was one of my earliest attempts, and I never have found another caterpillar, or any eggs, though I often search the poplars for them.
However, something better happened. I say better, because I think if they will make honest confession, all people who have gathered eggs and raised caterpillars from them in confinement, by feeding cut leaves, will admit that the pupa cases they get, and the moths they produce are only about half size. The big fine cases and cocoons are the ones you find made by caterpillars in freedom, or by those that have passed at least the fourth or fifth moult out of doors. So it was a better thing for my illustration, and for my painting, when in June of this year, Raymond, in crossing town from a ball game, found a large, perfect Modesta female. He secured her in his hat, and hurried to me. Raymond's hat has had many wonderful things in it besides his head, and his pockets are always lumpy with boxes.
Although perfect, she had mated, deposited her eggs, and was declining. All she wanted was to be left alone, and she would sit with wings widespread wherever placed. I was in the orchard, treating myself to some rare big musky red raspberries that are my especial property, when Raymond came with her. He set her on a shoot before me, and guarded her while I arranged a camera. She was the most complacent subject I ever handled outdoors, and did not make even an attempt to fly. Raymond was supposed to be watching while I worked, but our confidence in her was so great, that I paid all my attention to polishing my lenses, and getting good light, while Raymond gathered berries with one hand, and promiscuously waved the net over the bushes with the other.
During the first exposure, Modesta was allowed to place and poise herself as seemed natural. For a second, I used the brush on her gently, and coaxed her wings into spreading a little wider than was natural. These positions gave every evidence of being pleasing and yet I was not satisfied. There was something else in the back of my head that kept obtruding itself as I walked to the Cabin, with the beautiful moth clinging to my fingers. I did not feel quite happy about her, so she was placed in a large box, lined with corrugated paper, to wait a while until the mist in my brain cleared, and my nebulous disturbance evolved an idea. It came slowly. I had a caterpillar long ago, and had investigated the history of this moth. I asked Raymond where he found her and he said, "Coming from the game." Now I questioned him about the kind of a tree, and he promptly answered, "On one of those poplars behind the schoolhouse."
That was the clue. Instantly I recognized it. A poplar limb was what I wanted. Its fine, glossy leaf, flattened stem, and smooth upright twigs made a setting, appropriate, above all others, for the Modest moth.
I explained the situation to the Deacon, and he had Brenner drive with him to the Hirschy farm, and help secure a limb from one of the very few Lombardy poplars of this region. They drove very fast, and I had to trouble to induce Modesta to clamber over a poplar twig, and settle. Then by gently stroking, an unusual wing sweep was secured, because there is a wonderful purple-pink and a peculiar blue on the back wings.
It has been my experience that the longer a moth of these big short-lived subjects remains out of doors, the paler its colours become, and most of them fade rapidly when mounted, if not kept in the dark. So my Modesta may have been slightly faded, but she could have been several shades paler and yet appeared most beautiful to me.
Her head, shoulders, and abdomen were a lovely dove grey; that soft tan grey, with a warm shade, almost suggestive of pink. I suppose the reason I thought of this was because at the time two pairs of doves, one on a heap of driftwood overhanging the river, and the other in an apple tree in the Aspy orchard a few rods away, were giving me much trouble, and I had dove grey on my mind.
This same dove grey coloured the basic third of the fore-wings. Then they were crossed with a band only a little less in width, of rich cinnamon brown. There was a narrow wavy line of lighter brown, and the remaining third of the wing was paler, but with darker shadings. These four distinct colour divisions were exquisitely blended, and on the darkest band, near the costa, was a tiny white half moon. The under sides of the fore-wings were a delicate brownish grey, with heavy flushings of a purplish pink, a most beautiful colour.
The back wings were dove colour near the abdomen, more of a mouse colour around the edges, and beginning strongly at the base, and spreading in lighter shade over the wing, was the same purplish pink of the front under-wing, only much stronger. Near the abdomen, a little below half the length, and adjoining the grey; each wing had a mark difficult to describe in shape, and of rich blue colour.
The antennae stood up stoutly, and were of dove grey on one side, and white on the other. The thorax, legs, and under side of the abdomen were more of the mouse grey in colour. Over the whole moth in strong light, there was an almost intangible flushing of palest purplish pink. It may have shaded through the fore-wing from beneath, and over the back wing from above. At any rate, it was there, and so lovely and delicate was the whole colour scheme, it made me feel that I would give much to see a newly emerged male of this species. In my childhood my mother called this colour aniline red.
I once asked a Chicago importer if he believed that Oriental rug weavers sometimes use these big night moths as colour guides in their weaving. He said he had heard this, and gave me the freedom of his rarest rugs. Of course the designs woven into these rugs have a history, and a meaning for those who understand. There were three, almost priceless, one of which I am quite sure copied its greys, terra cotta, and black shades from Cecropia.
There was another, a rug of pure silk, that never could have touched a floor, or been trusted outside a case, had it been my property, that beyond all question took its exquisite combinations of browns and tans with pink lines, and peacock blue designs from Polyphemus. A third could have been copied from no moth save Modesta, for it was dove grey, mouse grey, and cinnamon brown, with the purplish pink of the back wings, and exactly the blue of their decorations. Had this rug been woven of silk, as the brown one, that moment would have taught me why people sometimes steal when they cannot afford to buy. Examination of the stock of any importer of high grade rugs will convince one who knows moths, that many of our commonest or their near relatives native to the Orient are really used as models for colour combinations in rug weaving. The Herat frequently has moths in its border.
The Modest moth has a wing sweep in large females of from five and one-half to six inches. In my territory they are very rare, only a few caterpillars and one moth have fallen to me. This can be accounted for by the fact that the favourite food tree of the caterpillar is so scarce, for some reason having become almost extinct, except in a few cases where they are used for shade.
The eggs are a greyish green, and have the pearly appearance of almost all moth eggs. On account of white granules, the caterpillar cannot fail to be identified. The moths in their beautiful soft colouring are well worth search and study. They are as exquisitely shaded as any, and of a richness difficult to describe.
CHAPTER XIV The Pride of the Lilacs: Attacus Promethea
So far as the arrangement ofthe subjects of this book in family groupings is concerned, any chapter might come first or last. It is frankly announced as the book of the Nature Lover, and as such is put together in the form that appears to me easiest to comprehend and most satisfying to examine. I decided that it would be sufficient to explain the whole situation to the satisfaction of any one, if I began the book with a detailed history of moth, egg, caterpillar, and cocoon and then gave complete portrayal of each stage in the evolution of one cocoon and one pupa case moth. I began with Cecropia, the commonest of all and one of the most beautiful for the spinners, and ended with Regalis, of earth—and the rarest.
The luck I had in securing Regalis in such complete form seems to me the greatest that ever happened to any, worker in this field, and it reads more like a fairy tale than sober every-day fact, copiously illustrated with studies from life. At its finish I said, "Now I am done. This book is completed." Soon afterward, Raymond walked in with a bunch of lilac twigs in his hand from which depended three rolled leaves securely bound to their twigs by silk spinning.
"I don't remember that we ever found any like these," he said.
'Would you be interested in them?'
Would I? Instantly I knew this book was not finished. As I held the firm, heavy, leaf-rolled cocoons in my hand, I could see the last chapter sliding over from fourteen to fifteen to make place for Promethea, the loveliest of the Attacine group, a cousin of Cecropia. Often I had seen the pictured cocoon, in its neat little, tight little leaf-covered shelter, and the mounted moths of scientific collections and museums; I knew their beautiful forms and remembered the reddish tinge flushing the almost black coat of the male and the red wine and clay-coloured female with her elaborate marks, spots, and lines. Right there the book stopped at leaf-fall early in November to await the outcome of those three cocoons. If they would yield a pair in the spring, and if that pair would emerge close enough together to mate and produce fertile eggs, then by fall of the coming year I would have a complete life history. That was a long wait, thickly punctuated with 'ifs.'
Then the twig was carried to my room and stood in a vase of intricate workmanship and rare colouring.
Every few days I examined those cocoons and tested them by weight. I was sure they were perfect. That spring I had been working all day and often at night, so I welcomed an opportunity to spend a few days at a lake where I would meet many friends; boating and fishing were fine, while the surrounding country was one uninterrupted panorama of exquisite land and water pictures. I packed and started so hastily I forgot my precious cocoons. Two weeks later on my return, before I entered the Cabin, I walked round it to see if my flowers had been properly watered and tended. It was not later than three in the afternoon but I saw at least a dozen wonderful big moths, dusky and luring, fluttering eagerly over the wild roses covering a south window of the Deacon's room adjoining mine on the west. Instantly I knew what that meant. I hurried to the room and found a female Promothea at the top of the screen covering a window that the caretaker had slightly lowered. I caught up a net and ran to bring a step-ladder. The back foundation is several feet high and that threw the tops of the windows close under the eaves. I mounted to the last step and balancing made a sweep to capture a moth. They could see me and scattered in all directions. I waited until they were beginning to return, when from the thicket of leaves emerged a deep rose-flushed little moth that sailed away, with every black one in pursuit. I almost fell from the ladder. I went inside, only to learn that what I feared was true. The wind had loosened the screen in my absence, and the moth had passed through a crack, so narrow it seemed impossible for it to escape.
Only those interested as I was, and who have had similar experience, know how to sympathize. I had thought a crowbar would be required to open one of those screens! With sinking heart I hurried to my room. Joy! There was yet hope! The escaped moth was the only one that had emerged. The first thing was to fasten the screen, the next to live with the remaining cocoons.
The following morning another, female appeared, and a little later a male.
The cocoons were long, slender, closely leaf-wrapped and hung from stout spinning longer than the average leaf stem. The outside leaf covering easily could be peeled away as the spinning did not seem to adhere except at the edges. There was a thin waterproof coating as with Cecropia, then a little loose spinning that showed most at top and bottom, the leaf wrapping being so closely drawn that it was plastered against the body of the heavy inner case around the middle until it adhered. The inner case was smooth and dark inside and the broken pupa case nearly black.
The male and female differed more widely in colour and markings than any moths with which I had worked. At a glance, the male reminded me of a monster Mourning Cloak butterfly. The front wings from the base extending over half the surface were a dark brownish black, outlined with a narrow escalloped line of clay colour of light shade. The black colour from here lightened as it neared the margin. At the apex it changed to a reddish brown tinge that surrounded the typical eye-spot of all the Attacus group for almost three-fourths of its circumference. The bottom of the eye was blackish blue, shading abruptly to pale blue at the top. The straggle M of white was in its place at the extreme tip, on the usual rose madder field. From there a broad clay-coloured band edged the wing and joined the dark colour in escallops. Through the middle of it in an irregular wavy line was traced an almost hair-fine marking of strong brown. The back wings were darker than the darkest part of the fore-wings and this colour covered them to the margin, lightening very slightly. A clay-coloured band bordered the edge, touched with irregular splashes of dark brown, a little below them a slightly heavier line than that on the fore-wing, which seemed to follow the outline of the decorations.
Underneath, the wings were exquisitely marked, flushed, and shaded almost past description in delicate and nearly intangible reddish browns, rose madder on grey, pink-tinged brown and clay colour. On the fore-wings the field from base to first line was reddish brown with a faint tinge of tan beside the costa. From this to the clay-coloured border my descriptive powers fail. You could see almost any shade for which you looked. There were greyish places flushed with scales of red and white so closely set that the result was frosty pink. Then the background would change to brown with the same over-decoration. The bottom of the eye-spot was dark only about one-fourth the way, the remaining three-fourths, tan colour outlined at the top with pale blue and black in fine lines. The white M showed through on a reddish background, as did the brown line of the clay border. The back wings widespread were even lovelier. Beginning about the eighth of an inch from the top was a whitish line tracing a marking that when taken as a whole on both outspread wings, on some, slightly resembled a sugar maple leaf, and on others, the perfect profile of a face. There was a small oblong figure of pinkish white where the eye would fall, and the field of each space was brownish red velvet. From this to the clay-coloured band with its paler brown markings and lines, the pink and white scales sprinkled the brown ground; most of the pink, around the marking, more of the white, in the middle of the space; so few of either, that it appeared to be brown where the clay border joined.
The antennae were shaped as all of the Attacus group, but larger in proportion to size, for my biggest Promethea measured only four and a quarter from tip to tip, and for his inches carried larger antlers than any Cecropia I ever saw of this measurement, those of the male being very much larger than the female. In colour they were similar to the darkest part of the wings, as were the back of the head, thorax and abdomen. The hair on the back of the thorax was very long. The face wore a pink flush over brown, the eyes bright brown, the under thorax covered with long pinkish brown hairs, and the legs the same. A white stripe ran down each side of the abdomen, touched with a dot of brownish red wine colour on the rings. The under part was pinkish wine crossed with a narrow white line at each segment. The claspers were prominent and sharp. The finishing touch of the exquisite creation lay in the fact that in motion, in strong light the red wine shadings of the under side cast an intangible, elusive, rosy flush over the dark back of the moth that was the mast delicate and loveliest colour effect I ever have seen on marking of flower, bird, or animal.
For the first time in all my experience with moths the female was less than the male.
Even the eggs of this mated pair carried a pinkish white shade and were stained with brown. They were ovoid in shape and dotted the screen door in rows. The tiny caterpillars were out eleven days later and proved to be of the kind that march independently from their shells without stopping to feed on them. Of every food offered, the youngsters seemed to prefer lilac leaves; I remembered that they had passed the winter wrapped in these, dangling from their twigs, and that the under wings of the male and much of the female bore a flushing of colour that was lilac, for what else is red wine veiled with white? So I promptly christened them, 'The Pride of the Lilacs.' They were said to eat ash, apple pear, willow, plum, cherry, poplar and many other leaves, but mine liked lilac, and there was a supply in reach of the door, so they undoubtedly were lilac caterpillars, for they had nothing else to eat.
The little fellows were pronouncedly yellow. The black head with a grey stripe joined the thorax with a yellow band. The body was yellow with black rings, the anal parts black, the legs pale greyish yellow. They made their first moult on the tenth day and when ready to eat again they were stronger yellow than before, with many touches of black. They moulted four times, each producing slight changes until the third, when the body took on a greenish tinge, delicate and frosty in appearance. The heads were yellow with touches of black, and the anal shield even stronger yellow, with black. At the last moult there came a touch of red on the thorax, and of deep blue on the latter part of the body.
In spinning they gummed over the upper surface of a leaf and, covering it with silk, drew it together so that nothing could be seen of the work inside. They began spinning some on the forty-second, some on the forty-third day, when about three inches in length and plump to bursting. I think at a puncture in the skin they would have spurted like a fountain. They began spinning at night and were from sight before I went to them the following morning. So I hunted a box and packed them away with utmost care.
I selected a box in which some mounted moths had been sent me by a friend in Louisiana, and when I went to examine my cocoons toward spring, to my horror I found the contents of the box chopped to pieces and totally destroyed. Pestiferous little 'clothes' moths must have infested the box, for there were none elsewhere in the Cabin. For a while this appeared to be too bad luck; but when luck turns squarely against you, that is the time to test the essence and quality of the word 'friend.' So I sat me down and wrote to my friend, Professor Rowley, of Missouri, and told him I wanted Promethea for the completion of this book; that I had an opportunity to make studies of them and my plate was light-struck, and house-moths had eaten my cocoons. Could he do anything? To be sure he could. I am very certain he sent me two dozen 'perfectly good' cocoons.
From the abundance of males that have come to seek females of this species at the Cabin, ample proof seems furnished that they are a very common Limberlost product; but I never have found, even when searching for them, or had brought to me a cocoon of this variety, save the three on one little branch found by Raymond, when he did not know what they were. Because of the length of spinning which these caterpillars use to attach their cocoons, they dangle freely in the wind, and this gives them especial freedom from attack.
CHAPTER XV The King of the Poets: Citheronia Regalis
To the impetuosity of youth I owe my first acquaintance with the rarest moth of the Limberlost; "not common anywhere," say scientific authorities. Molly-Cotton and I were driving to Portland-town, ten miles south of our home. As customary, I was watching fields, woods, fence corners and roadside in search of subjects; for many beautiful cocoons and caterpillars, much to be desired, have been located while driving over the country on business or pleasure.
With the magnificent independence of the young, Molly-Cotton would have scouted the idea that she was searching for moths also, but I smiled inwardly as I noticed her check the horse several times and scan a wayside bush, or stretch of snake fence. We were approaching the limits of town, and had found nothing; a slow rain was falling, and the shimmer on bushes and fences made it difficult to see objects plainly. Several times I had asked her to stop the horse, or drive close the fields when I was sure of a moth or caterpillar, though it was very late, being close the end of August; but we found only a dry leaf, or some combination that had deceived me.
Just on the outskirts of Portland, beside a grassy ditch and at the edge of a cornfield, grew a cluster of wild tiger lilies. The water in the ditch had kept them in flower long past their bloomtime. On one of the stems there seemed to be a movement.
"Wait a minute!" I cried, and Molly-Cotton checked the horse, but did not stop, while I leaned forward and scanned the lilies carefully. What I thought I saw move appeared to be a dry lily bloom of an orange-red colour, that had fallen and lodged on the grasses against a stalk.
"It's only a dead lily," I said; "drive on."
"Is there a moth that colour?" asked Molly-Cotton.
"Yes," I replied. "There is an orange-brown species, but it is rare. I never have seen a living one."
So we passed the lilies. A very peculiar thing is that when one grows intensely interested in a subject, and works over it, a sort of instinct, an extra sense as it were, is acquired. Three rods away, I became certain I had seen something move, so strongly the conviction swept over me that we had passed a moth. Still, it was raining, and the ditch was wet and deep.
"I am sorry we did not stop," I said, half to myself, "I can't help feeling that was a moth."
There is where youth, in all its impetuosity, helped me. If the girl had asked, "Shall I go back?" in all probability I would have answered, "No, I must have been mistaken. Drive on!"
Instead, Molly-Cotton, who had straightened herself, and touched up her horse for a brisk entrance into town, said, "Well, we will just settle that 'feeling' right here!"
At a trot, she deftly cut a curve in the broad road and drove back. She drew close the edge of the ditch as we approached the lilies. As the horse stopped, what I had taken for a fallen lily bloom, suddenly opened to over five inches of gorgeous red-brown, canary-spotted wing sweep, and then closed again.
"It is a moth!" we gasped, with one breath.
Molly-Cotton cramped the wheel on my side of the carriage and started to step down. Then she dropped back to the seat.
"I am afraid," she said. "I don't want you to wade that ditch in the rain, but you never have had a red one, and if I bungle and let it escape, I never will forgive myself."
She swung the horse to the other side, and I climbed down. Gathering my skirts, I crossed the ditch as best I could, and reached the lily bed, but I was trembling until my knees wavered. I stepped between the lilies and the cornfield, leaned over breathlessly, and waited in the pelting rain, until the moth again raised its wings above its back. Then with a sweep learned in childhood, I had it.
While crossing the ditch, I noticed there were numbers of heavy yellow paper bags lying where people had thrown them when emptied of bananas and biscuits, on leaving town. They were too wet to be safe, but to carry the moth in my fingers would spoil it for a study, so I caught up and drained a big bag; carefully set my treasure inside, and handed it to Molly-Cotton. If you consider the word 'treasure' too strong to fit the case, offer me your biggest diamond, ruby, or emerald, in recompense for the privilege of striking this chapter, with its accompanying illustration, from my book, and learn what the answer will be.
When I entered the carriage and dried my face and hands, we peeped, marvelled, and exclaimed in wonder, for this was the most gorgeous moth of our collections. We hastened to Portland, where we secured a large box at a store. In order that it might not be dark and set the moth beating in flight, we copiously punctured it with as large holes as we dared, and bound the lid securely. On the way home we searched the lilies and roadside for a mile, but could find no trace of another moth. Indeed, it seemed a miracle that we had found this one late in August, for the time of their emergence is supposed to be from middle May to the end of June. Professor Rowley assures me that in rare instances a moth will emerge from a case or cocoon two seasons old, and finding this one, and the Luna, prove it is well for nature students to be watchful from May until October. Because these things happened to me in person, I made bold to introduce the capture of a late moth into the experience of Edith Carr in the last chapter of "A Girl of the Limberlost." I am pointing out some of these occurrences as I come to them, in order that you may see how closely I keep to life and truth, even in books exploited as fiction. There may be such incidents that are pure imagination incorporated; but as I write I can recall no instance similar to this, in any book of mine, that is not personal experience, or that did not happen to other people within my knowledge, or was not told me by some one whose word I consider unquestionable; allowing very little material indeed, on the last provision.
There is one other possibility to account for the moth at this time. Beyond all question the gorgeous creature is of tropical origin. It has made its way north from South or Central America. It occurs more frequently in Florida and Georgia than with us, and there it is known to have been double brooded; so standing on the records of professional lepidopterists, that gives rise to grounds for the possibility that in some of our long, almost tropical Indiana summers, Regalis may be double brooded with us. At any rate, many people saw the living moth in my possession on this date. In fact, I am prepared to furnish abundant proof of every statement contained in this chapter; while at the same time admitting that it reads like the veriest fairy tale 'ever thought or wondered.'
The storm had passed and the light was fine, so we posed the moth before the camera several times. It was nervous business, for he was becoming restless, and every instant I expected him to fly, but of course we kept him guarded.
There was no hope of a female that late date, so the next step was to copy his colours and markings as exactly as possible. He was the gaudiest moth of my experience, and his name seemed to suit rarely well. Citheroma—a Greek poet, and Regalis—regal. He was truly royal and enough to inspire poetry in a man of any nation. His face-was orange-brown, of so bright a shade that any one at a glance would have called it red. His eyes were small for his size, and his antennae long, fine, and pressed against the face so closely it had to be carefully scrutinized to see them. A band of bright canary-yellow arched above them, his thorax was covered above with long silky, orange-brown hairs, and striped lengthwise with the same yellow. His abdomen was the longest and slenderest I had seen, elegantly curved like a vase, and reaching a quarter of an inch beyond the back wings, which is unusual. It was thickly covered with long hair, and faintly lined at the segments with yellow. The claspers were very sharp, prominent brown hooks. His sides were dotted with alternating red and orangebrown spots, and his thorax beneath, yellow. The under side of the abdomen was yellow, strongly shaded with orange-brown. His legs and feet were the same.
His fore-wings were a silvery lead colour, each vein covered with a stripe of orange-brown three times its width. The costa began in lead colour, and at half its extent shaded into orange-brown. Each front wing had six yellow spots, and a seventh faintly showing. Half an inch from the apex of the wings, and against the costa, lay the first and second spots, oblong in shape, and wide enough to cover the space between veins. The third was a tiny dot next the second. The hint of one crossed the next vein, and the other three formed a triangle; one lay at the costa about three-quarters of an inch from the base, the second at the same distance from the base at the back edge of the wing, and the third formed the apex, and fell in the middle, on the fifth space between veins, counting from either edge. These were almost perfectly round. The back wings were very hairy, of a deep orange-brown at the base, shading to lighter tones of the same colour at the edge, and faintly clouded in two patches with yellow.
Underneath the fore-wings were yellow at the base, and lead colour the remainder of their length. The veins had the orange-red outlining, and the two large yellow dots at the costa showed through as well as the small one beside them. Then came another little yellow dot of the same size, that did not show on the upper side, and then four larger round spots between each vein. Two of them showed in the triangle on the upper side full size, and the two between could be seen in the merest speck, if looked for very closely.
The back wings underneath were yellow three-fourths of their length, then next the abdomen began a quarter of an inch wide band of orange-brown, that crossed the wing to the third vein from the outer edge, and there shaded into lead colour, and covered the space to the margin. The remainder of the wing below this band was a lighter shade of yellow than above it. From tip to tip he measured five and a half inches, and from head to point of abdomen a little over two.
While I was talking Regalis, and delighted over finding so late in the season the only one I lacked to complete my studies of every important species, Arthur Fensler brought me a large Regalis caterpillar, full fed, and in the last stages of the two days of exercise that every caterpillar seems to take before going into the pupa state. It was late in the evening, so I put the big fellow in a covered bucket of soft earth from the garden, planning to take his picture the coming day. Before morning he had burrowed into the earth from sight, and was pupating, so there was great risk in disturbing him. I was afraid there were insects in the earth that would harm him, as care had not been taken to bake it, as should have been done.
A day later Willis Glendenning brought me another Regalis caterpillar. I made two pictures of it, although transformation to the pupa stage was so far advanced that it was only half length, and had a shrivelled appearance like the one I once threw away. I was disgusted with the picture at the time, but now I feel that it is very important in the history of transformation from caterpillar to pupa, and I am glad to have it.
Two days later, Andrew Idlewine, a friend to my work, came to the Deacon with a box. He said that he thought maybe I would like to take a picture of the fellow inside, and if I did, he wanted a copy; and he wished he knew what the name of it was. He had found it on a butternut tree, and used great care in taking it lest it 'horn' him. He was horrified when the Deacon picked it up, and demonstrated how harmless it was. This is difficult to believe, but it was a third Regalis and came into my possession at night again. My only consolation was that it was feeding, and would not pupate until I could make a picture. This one was six inches from tip to tip, the largest caterpillar I ever saw; a beautiful blue-green colour, with legs of tan marked with black, each segment having four small sharp horns on top, and on the sides an oblique dash of pale blue. The head bore ten horns. Four of these were large, an inch in length, coloured tan at the base, black at the tip. The foremost pair of this formidable array turned front over the face, all the others back, and the outside six of the ten were not quite the length of the largest ones.
The first caterpillar had measured five inches, and the next one three, but it was transforming. Whether the others were males and this a female, or whether it was only that it had grown under favourable conditions, I could not tell. It was differently marked on the sides, and in every way larger, and brighter than the others, and had not finished feeding. Knowing that it was called the 'horned hickory devil' at times, hickory and walnut leaves were placed in its box, and it evinced a decided preference for the hickory. As long as it ate and seemed a trifle larger it was fed. The day it walked over fresh leaves and began the preliminary travel, it was placed on some hickory sprouts around an old stump, and exposures made on it, or rather on the places it had been, for it was extremely restless and difficult to handle. Two plates were spoiled for me by my subject walking out of focus as I snapped, but twice it was caught broadside in good position.
While I was working with this caterpillar, there came one of my clearest cases of things that 'thrust themselves upon me.' I would have preferred to concentrate all my attention on the caterpillar, for it was worth while; but in the midst of my work a katydid deliberately walked down the stump, and stopped squarely before the lens to wash her face and make her toilet. She was on the side of the stump, and so clearly outlined by the lens that I could see her long wavering antennae on the ground glass, and of course she took two plates before she resumed her travels. I long had wanted a katydid for an illustration. I got that one merely by using what was before me. All I did was to swing the lens about six inches, and shift the focus slightly, to secure two good exposures of her in fine positions. My caterpillar almost escaped while I worked, for it had put in the time climbing to the ground, and was a yard away hurrying across the grass at a lively pace.
Two days later it stopped travelling, and pupated on the top of the now hardened earth in the bucket that contained the other two. It was the largest of the pupae when it emerged, a big shining greenish brown thing flattened and seeming as if it had been varnished. On the thin pupa case the wing shields and outlines of the head and different parts of the body could be seen. Then a pan of sand was baked, and a box with a glass cover was filled. I laid the pupa on top of the sand, and then dug up the first one, as I was afraid of the earth in which it lay. The case was sound, and in fine condition. All of these pupae lived and seemed perfect. Narrow antennae and abdominal formation marked the big one a female, while broader antlers and the clearly outlined 'claspers' proved the smaller ones males. A little sphagnum moss, that was dampened slightly every few days, was kept around them. The one that entered the ground had pushed the earth from it on all, sides at a depth of three inches, and hollowed an oval space the size of a medium hen egg, in which the pupa lay, but there was no trace of its cast skin. Those that pupated on the ground had left their skins at the thorax, and lay two inches from them. The horns came off with the skin, and the lining of the segments and the covering of the feet showed. At first the cast skins were green, but they soon turned a dirty grey, and the horns blackened.
So from having no personal experience at all with our rarest moth, inside a few days of latter August and early September, weeks after hope had been abandoned for the season, I found myself with several as fine studies of the male as I could make, one of an immense caterpillar at maturity, one half-transformed to the moth, and three fine pupa cases. Besides, I had every reason to hope that in the spring I could secure eggs and a likeness of a female to complete my illustration. Call this luck, fairy magic, what you will, I admit it sounds too good to be true; but it is.
All winter these three fine Regalis pupa cases were watched solicitously, as well as my twin Cecropias, some Polyphemus, and several ground cocoons so spun on limbs and among debris that it was not easy to decide whether they were Polyphemus or Luna. When spring came, and the Cecropias emerged at the same time, I took heart, for I admit I was praying for a pair of Regalis moths from those pupa cases in order that a female, a history of their emergence, and their eggs, might be added to the completion of this chapter. In the beginning it was my plan to use the caterpillars, and give the entire history of one spinning, and one burrowing moth. My Cecropia records were complete; I could add the twin series for good measure for the cocoon moth; now if only a pair would come from these pupa cases, I would have what I wanted to compile the history of a ground moth.
Until the emergence of the Cecropias, my cocoons and pupa cases were kept on my dresser. Now I moved the box to a chair beside my bed. That was a lucky thought, for the first moth appeared at midnight, from Mr. Idlewine's case. She pushed the wing shields away with her feet, and passed through the opening. She was three and one-half inches LONG, with a big pursy abdomen, and wings the size of my thumbnail. I was anxious for a picture of her all damp and undeveloped, beside the broken pupa case; but I was so fearful of spoiling my series I dared not touch, or try to reproduce her. The head and wings only seemed damp, but the abdomen was quite wet, and the case contained a quantity of liquid, undoubtedly ejected for the purpose of facilitating exit. When you next examine a pupa, study the closeness with which the case fits antennae, eyes, feet, wings, head, thorax, and abdominal rings and you will see that it would be impossible for the moth to separate from the case and leave it with down intact, if it were dry.
Immediately the moth began racing around energetically, and flapping those tiny wings until the sound awakened the Deacon in the adjoining room. After a few minutes of exercise, it seemed in danger of injuring the other cases, so it was transferred to the dresser, where it climbed to the lid of a trinket case, and clinging with the feet, the wings hanging, development began. There was no noticeable change in the head and shoulders, save that the down grew fluffier as it dried. The abdomen seemed to draw up, and became more compact. No one can comprehend the story of the wings unless they have seen them develop.
At twelve o'clock and five minutes, they measured two-thirds of an inch from the base of the costa to the tip. At twelve fifteen they were an inch and a quarter. At half-past twelve they were two inches. At twelve forty-five they were two and a half; and at one o'clock they were three inches. At complete expansion this moth measured six and a half inches strong (sic!), and this full sweep was developed in one hour and ten minutes. To see those large brilliantly-coloured wings droop, widen, and develop their markings, seemed little short of a miracle.
The history of the following days is painful. I not only wanted a series of this moth as I wanted nothing else concerning the book, but with the riches of three fine pupa cases of it on hand, I had promised Professor Rowley eggs from which to obtain its history for himself. I had taxed Mr. Rowley's time and patience as an expert lepidopterist, to read my text, and examine my illustration; and I hoped in a small way to repay his kindness by sending him a box of fertile Regalis eggs.
The other pupa cases were healthful and lively, but the moths would not emerge. I coaxed them in the warmth of closed palms—I even laid them on dampened moss in the sun in the hope of softening the cases, and driving the moths out with the heat, but to no avail. They would not come forth.
I had made my studies of the big moth, when she was fully developed; but to my despair, she was depositing worthless eggs over the inside of my screen door.
Four days later, the egg-laying period over, the female, stupid and almost gone, a fine male emerged, and the following day another. I placed some of the sand from the bottom of the box on a brush tray, and put these two cases on it, and set a focused camera in readiness, so that I got a side view of a moth just as it emerged, and one facing front when about ready to cling for wing expansion. The history of their appearance, was similar to that of the female, only they were smaller, and of much brighter. colour. The next morning I wrote Professor Rowley of my regrets at being unable to send the eggs as I had hoped.
At noon I came home from half a day in the fields, to find Raymond sitting on the Cabin steps with a big box. That box contained a perfect pair of mated Regalis moths. This was positively the last appearance of the fairies.
Raymond had seen these moths clinging to the under side of a rail while riding. He at once dismounted, coaxed them on a twig, and covering them with his hat, he weighted the brim with stones. Then he rode to the nearest farm-house for a box, and brought the pair safely to me. Several beautiful studies of them were made, into one of which I also introduced my last moth to emerge, in order to show the males in two different positions.
The date was June tenth. The next day the female began egg placing. A large box was lined with corrugated paper, so that she could find easy footing, and after she had deposited many eggs on this, fearing some element in it might not be healthful for them, I substituted hickory leaves.
Then the happy time began. Soon there were heaps of pearly pale yellow eggs piled in pyramids on the leaves, and I made a study of them. Then I gently lifted a leaf, carried it outdoors and, in full light, reproduced the female in the position in which she deposited her eggs, even in the act of placing them. Of course, Molly-Cotton stood beside with a net in one hand to guard, and an umbrella in the other to shade the moth, except at the instant of exposure; but she made no movement indicative of flight.
I made every study of interest of which I could think. Then I packed and mailed Professor Rowley about two hundred fine fertile eggs, with all scientific data. I only kept about one dozen, as I could think of nothing more to record of this moth except the fact that I had raised its caterpillar. As I explained in the first chapter, from information found in a work on moths supposed to be scientific and accurate, I depended on these caterpillars to emerge in sixteen days. The season was unusually rainy and unfavourable for field work, and I had a large contract on hand for outdoor stuff. I was so extremely busy, I was glad to box the eggs, and put them out of mind until the twenty-seventh. By the merest chance I handled the box on the twentyfourth, and found six caterpillars starved to death, two more feeble, and four that seemed lively. One of these was bitten by some insect that clung to a leaf placed in their box for food, in spite of the fact that all leaves were carefully washed. One died from causes unknown. One stuck in pupation, and moulded in its skin. Three went through the succession of moults and feeding periods in fine shape, and the first week in September transformed into shiny pupa cases, not one of which was nearly as large as that of the caterpillar brought to me by Mr. Idlewine. I fed these caterpillars on black walnut leaves, as they ate them in preference to hickory.
I am slightly troubled about this moth. In Packard's "Guide to the Study of Moths", he writes: "Citheronia Regalis expands five to six inches, and its fore-wings are olive coloured, spotted with yellow and veined with broad red lines, while the hind wings are orange-red, spotted with olive, green, and yellow."
He describes two other species. Citheronia Mexicana, a tropical moth that has drifted as far north as Mexico. It is quite similar to Regalis, "having more orange and less red," but it is not recorded as having been found within a thousand miles of my locality. A third small species, Citheronia sepulcralis, expands only a little over three inches, is purple-brown with yellow spots; and is a rare Atlantic Coast species having been found once in Massachusetts, oftener in Georgia, never west of Pennsylvania.
This eliminates them as possible Limberlost species. Professor
Rowley raised this moth from the eggs I sent him.
The trouble is this: Packard describes the fore-wings as 'olive,' the hind as 'olive, and green.' Holland makes no reference to colour, but on plate X, figure three, page eighty-seven, he reproduces Regalis with fore-wings of olive-green, the remainder of the colour as I describe and paint, only lighter. In all the Regalis moths I have handled, raised, studied minutely, painted, and photographed, there never has been tinge or shade of GREEN. Not the slightest trace of it! Each moth, male and female, has had a basic colour of pure lead or steel grey. White tinged with the proper proportions of black and blue gives the only colour that will exactly match it. I have visited my specimen case since writing the preceding. I find there the bodies of four Regalis moths, saved after their decline. One is four years old, one three, the others two, all have been exposed to daylight for that length of time. The yellows are slightly faded, the reds very much degraded, the greys a half lighter than when fresh; but showing to-day a pure, clear grey.
What troubles me is whether Regalis of the Limberlost is grey, where others are green; or whether I am colour blind or these men. Referring to other writers, I am growing 'leery' of the word 'Authority'; half of what was written fifty years ago along almost any line you can mention, to-day stands disproved; all of us are merely seekers after the truth: so referring to other writers, I find the women of Massachusetts; who wrote "Caterpillars and Their Moths", and who in all probability have raised more different caterpillars for the purpose of securing life history than any other workers of our country, possibly of any, state that the front wings of Regalis have "stripes of lead colour between the veins of the wings," and "three or four lead-coloured stripes" on the back wings. The remainder of my description and colouring also agrees with theirs. If these men worked from museum or private collections, there is a possibility that chemicals used to kill, preserve, and protect the specimens from pests may have degraded the colours, and changed the grey to green. But to accept this as the explanation of the variance upsets all their colour values, so it must not be considered. This proves that there must be a Regalis that at times has olive-green stripes where mine are grey; but I never have seen one.
I think people need not fear planting trees on their premises that will be favourites with caterpillars, in the hope of luring exquisite te moths to become common with them. I have put out eggs, and released caterpillars near the Cabin, literally by the thousand, and never have been able to see the results by a single defoliated branch. Wrens, warblers, flycatchers, every small bird of the trees are exploring bark and scanning upper and under leaf surfaces for eggs and tiny caterpillars, and if they escape these, dozens of larger birds are waiting for the half-grown caterpillars, for in almost all instances these lack enough of the hairy coat of moss butterfly larvae to form any protection. Every season I watch my walnut trees to free them from the abominable 'tent' caterpillars; with the single exception of Halesidota Caryae, I never have had enough caterpillars of any species attack my foliage to be noticeable; and these in only one instance. If you care for moths you need not fear to encourage them; the birds will keep them within proper limits. If only one person enjoys this book one-tenth as much as I have loved the work of making it, then I am fully repaid.
End of Project Gutenberg's Moths of the Limberlost, by Gene Stratton-Porter