large stems of which it bores deep cylindrical holes, generally in the axillæ of the branches. It sallies out only by night, and brings to its dwelling whole leaves of the broad foliage of this tree with dexterity and great labour, exhibiting many marks of sagacity in its progress, and when it arrives at the entrance to its retreat, it raises up the covering with its hinder parts and slips into its cell backwards, dragging the leaf after it, the extreme end of the stalk being held artfully in its jaws. It does not quit its hold till the leaf be almost entirely within its cell, where it fastens it down, together with the covering of the entrance, by a web. It changes to a pupa within this cell, in January, making no web; it remains thus thirty days, and is on the wing in February, when it frequents the tops of lofty trees.
The larva is a nocturnal feeder, like the rest of this tribe, and does not differ much in its habits from the preceding species. It lodges in the stems of the Mimosa ensifolia, having the entrance to its gallery secured by a covering of excrement, which is held fast, when the inmate is within, by a web. The leaves of the mimosa are lanceolate, and of such a length as to preclude the possibility of being taken wholly within; the greater part of the leaf
