39 



Fig. 46.— Scales on the 

 wing- of the Cabbage Butter- 

 fly. They overlap like 

 shingles on a roof. 



the warm breezes of early spring. But if cold weather returns again 

 many a poor butterfly is frozen to death. Those that have been made 

 only'stiff" with cold, the sun's hot rays bring back to life again. 



The nature student will 

 observe that all the white 

 Cabbage Butterflies are not 

 marked exactly alike. Some 

 have two black spots just 

 below the middle of each 

 fore-wing, while others have 

 only one. The former are 

 the females, and the latter 

 the males (Fig. 45.) They 

 all have six legs, and four 

 wings covered with very 

 small scales, which brush off 

 readily. Under a microscope these scales can be 

 seen to have the shape and arrangement shown in 

 Fig. 46. 



But there are scale-winged insects which are 

 not butterflies ; for example, the large army of 

 moths, big and little, which are readily attracted 

 to lights during the late summer months. We 

 can, however, easily tell butterflies from moths 

 in these ways : The wings of butterflies at rest 

 are held erect, while those of moths are folded 

 closely over the back or by the sides ; the feelers, 

 or antennae, of the butterflies are always knobbed 

 at the tip, while those of moths are either simple Fif;-^*;--f^47i-v™^ 

 or feathery ; and butterflies fly about during the feelers, how the wings are 

 day, while moths as a rule fly at night or in the 

 dusk. (Fig. 47.) 



Like most butterflies, the white Cabbage Butterflies are fond of 

 sipping the honey of flowers ; but, unlike many, they show no decided 



liking for any special 

 color or plant. Some 

 observers are of the 

 opinion that they per- 

 haps visit yellowish- 

 white flowers most fre- 

 quently, but of this 

 fact we are not abso- 

 lutely certain. It is 

 always interesting to 

 creep up to a butterfly 

 which is sipping nectar 

 from a flower, and 

 watch it uncoil its long sucking tube and insert it into the corolla. The 

 honey is sucked up through the tube by means ot little muscles acting 



(«•) 



>"> 



Fig. 48.— Head of Cabbage But- 

 terfly, showing the sucking tubes 

 coiled in (a) and partly uncoiled in 

 (b). 



Fig. 49— The eargs of the 

 Cabbage Butterfly. 



