210 THE COLOURATION OF INSECTS 



the wing covers to show the red wings underneath. Such 

 an insect, a priori, must be distasteful, and proved to be 

 so when offered to my young monkey, who would eat 

 greedily until he was sick equally large, but procryptic, 

 grasshoppers. 



Since I offered this grasshopper to Wee Man he naturally 

 thought it would be edible, and at once seized it, though 

 he did not straightway bite it as he would have done 

 had it been the ordinary procryptic species he was accus- 

 tomed to eat. While he held.it in his hand the grasshopper 

 emitted copious bubbles of strongly smelling yellow froth 

 from the thoracic spiracles, forcing it out by first dis- 

 tending and then strongly contracting the abdomen, so 

 that a hissing sound was produced, audible several yards 

 away. At the same time the wing covers were raised 

 so as to display the bright red, black bordered wings. 



Wee Man was obviously much interested in this very 

 curious and, to him, novel phenomenon, and tasted the 

 froth, but though he obviously did not like it, he persisted 

 in trying to eat the insect, pulling it to pieces and tasting 

 each. But none of it was actually eaten ! 



Many other insects, none of which are procryptic, emit 

 strongly smelling, bright coloured fluid when roughly 

 handled. This is well known to all who have collected 

 Acraeine butterflies. 



The following is quoted from my article in Bedrock ^ : 



*' A most typically aposematic Arctiid moth {Bhodo- 

 gastria leucoptera) was found resting fully exposed on low 

 herbage. Its wings were of a pure hard shining white, 

 but not very thickly scaled, so that when they were brought 

 together over the body of the moth, the abdomen, which 

 was of a bright rose pink, was distinctly visible. The 

 thorax was pure white, spotted with black. The legs 

 were of the same bright rose as the abdomen. When 

 the moth was disturbed it separated its wings and spread 



' Vol. ii, 1913, "Notes on the Struggle for Existence in Tropical Africa." 



