1904.] PACKARD— ORIGIN OF MARKINGS OF ORGANISMS. 399 



crown blackbird, cuckoo, English sparrow, song sparrow and the 

 migrant shrike. I do not know of a kind that feeds upon butter- 

 flies during any month of the year to the extent of one-tenth of one 

 per cent, of its food." This is certainly a strong statement, and is 

 based on prolonged and very thorough investigations. 



Mr. L. H. Joutel informs me that he has seen the English 

 sparrow chase, seize and devour one Piei'is rapce and an Orgyia. 

 He also observed these birds running after and catching little moths 

 and flies, and also saw a sparrow pull off the abdomen of a large 

 moth and devour it. These birds will, in the side streets of New 

 York, dart cut into the open and apparently catch some insects, 

 and then perch on a neighboring tree or telephone pole. The 

 sparrow, which on the whole eats few destructive insects, is 

 occasionally in the city very voracious. Mr. Joutel had 150 cater- 

 pillars of Callosainia provieihea in the last stage on the shrubs in 

 his back yard on East 117th street. In the course of a couple of 

 hours in the forenoon the sparrows ate them all. And some 

 Japanese A. pernyi worms living on his oak trees were similarly 

 massacred. 



Mr. Joutel corroborates the statement made that Lycaenae when 

 at rest on a leaf hold the wings closed upright over the back, but 

 the hind wings with ocellus and tail are continually moved up and 

 down, so that the two little tails look like its antennae and the ocelli 

 like the eyes of the same butterfly. 



In a captured Thecla he observed where pieces had been bitten 

 out of the hind wings, as if attacked by some birds which had mis- 

 taken the hind wings for the head. 



Prof. J. B. Smith writes me: '^ I have never observed birds 

 chasing butterflies except once. That was some years ago and the 

 bird was a sparrow : the victim Pieris rapce^ 



Miss Caroline G. Soule writes : *' I have seen chipping sparrows, 

 Savannah and song sparrows catch and eat a {t\N V. viilberti, 

 P. rapcB and myrina butterflies. I have seen thistle-finches attack 

 turnus and cybele, but not eat them. I have seen dogs tdX philodice 

 more than birds. When it comes to moths the tale is quite differ- 

 ent. Clisiocauipa disstria and a?nericana (imago) are eaten by four 

 kinds of vireos, three kinds of fly-catchers, both cuckoos, robins, 

 rose grosbeaks, scarlet tanagers, cedar wax-wings, catbirds, orioles, 

 red-winged blackbirds, martins, song, chipping, and even English 

 sparrows. I noticed this fact for three successive seasons in 



