DEATHS-HEAD MOTH. 307 



ing strictly to that family, from which he is distinguished by 

 the very inferior length of his trunk, and also of his antennae. 

 His upper wings, which reach often to the extent of five inches, 

 are of deep brown, beautifully variegated with black, mingled 

 with rusty red, and powdered with grey ; the lower being of 

 a deep ochreous yellow, barred with black. The body is 

 somewhat similarly coloured in black and yellow stripes, 

 and on the shoulders or thorax, in lieu of the black horse-shoe 

 borne by the Sphinx Convolvuli, he exhibits (awfully con- 

 spicuous in yellowish white upon a ground of darkness !) the 

 grim cranium the death's head and collar bones to which 

 he owes his redoubted name. 



We shall have occasion to speak elsewhere of a few other 

 notabilities belonging to this singular insect especially of Iris 

 melancholy cry and the superstitious dread wherewith he was 

 once, and is still partially, regarded by man. We shall now, 

 therefore, only advert to one other of his peculiar habits, 

 which has given him, amongst other appellations, that of the 

 " Bee Tiger." 



We have noticed already the shortness of the Death's-head 

 trunk, as compared with that of a true sphinx ; it consists, in 

 fact, of only a short, stiff proboscis, instead of a long pliant 

 sucker. In common, however, with the hawk-moth family, 

 he is a prodigious lover of honey. Either, then, for want of a 

 more convenient instrument for extracting nectar, fresh drawn 

 from tubular flowers, or in order that he may quaff it on a 



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