236 NATURAL HISTORY OF ARTHROPODS. 



tries, which arc dark-brown, spotted or banded with white or hyaline, giving them very 

 much the appearance of small hesperian butterflies. 



The most exquisitely beautiful of all this group is the Pochazia splendida from 

 New Guinea and the islands of the Malay archipelago. It measures a little more than 

 three-quarters of an inch across the spread wing-covers, and has a highly glossy surface 

 which serves to render more brilliant its somewhat iridescent colors. The thorax and 

 head are pitch-black, both marked beneath with orange. On the sides of the abdomen 

 a paler yellow prevails, and the legs are still paler yellow. But the wing-covers are 

 brilliant orange, changing to glassy behind the middle ; they are bordered all around 

 with a rich brown which reflects a steel-blue tinge, and catches a greenish tint where it 

 approaches the orange ground ; and on the disk is a double purplish-brown spot with 

 a pale bluish or white round pupil. Its wings are whitish-hyaline, also bordered with 

 brown, and with a pale brown cloud on the middle. This glowing beauty, when placed 

 in the sunlight, vies with the elegant satin of the most delicate Morphos, and in pat- 

 tern of marking recalls the little pearly butterflies of the Erycinid genus Mesosemia. 



Brazil claims but very few of these attractive insects ; but the most conspicuous 

 one which belongs to her domain is the Nbgodina. In this genus the close-set veins 

 are aggregated near the tip of the wing-covers, and the disk is full of small meshes 

 which become more numerous in the direction of the apex. JV. reticulata is a pale 

 ochre-brown species, measuring a full inch across the wing-covers ; with clear wings 

 crossed by three broken dark-brown bands, and with the apical and most of the costal 

 margin also marked with brown. The dark, rich brown of the wing-covers strongly 

 contrasts with the glassy surface upon which it is placed, and gives the insect very 

 much the appearance of one of the tortricid moths. It inhabits the vine-clad clear- 

 ings in the great forest region of Brazil, and dwells in lazy ease where multitudes of 

 its more remote relatives find equal gratification in sitting all day long imbibing the 

 juices of some convenient twig or bud. 



A step forward leads to the great and extraordinarily varied sub-family, Flatida. 

 Plere the exuberance of form and variety of pattern prevails almost beyond a parallel 

 in any other of the groups. Here the head is much narrower than the thorax, with 

 the prothorax produced forwards and narrowed in that direction. That part of the 

 mesothorax which is not covered by the wings is relatively larger than in the Issida, 

 and not always triangular. When the head is blunt, the vertex is short, but in some 

 small assemblages of species the latter is produced, and conical in outline. The wing- 

 covers are large, obtriangular, or lyrate, with the costal margin broad, dilated at base, 

 and crossed by numerous partly-forked veins. At base and on the clavus the surface 

 is usually more or less granulated ; the latter is well separated from the corium by the 

 suture, and has two very distinct curved veins running throughout its length. The genus 

 Flata, from which the group is named, now consists of large, semicircular winged 

 forms, one of which, the F. limbata, is of a bright grass-green color, having the wing- 

 covers bordered in front with bright red, while the wino-s are milk-white. It measures 



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more than an inch and three-fourths across the spread wings, and the wing-covers are 

 very distinctly marked by veins which branch very numerously and slenderly toward the 

 tip. It inhabits tropical India, and is reported to occur also in southern China. 



A common North American genus of this group is the Ormenis. It is, however, 

 not confined to this continent, but is represented by other species in various parts of 

 Africa. Two well-known species are common in the United States ; the one, O. sep- 

 tenti-ionalis, is a pale green insect, powdered with white, tinted on the front, on the 



