ORDER VI. 



LEPIDOPTERA. 



Papilionidae — Butterflies. 



The lepidopterous insects in general, soon after they 

 emerge from the pupa state, and commonly during their first 

 flight, discharge some drops of a red-colored fluid, more or 

 less intense in different species, which, in some instances, 

 where their numbers have been considerable, have produced 

 the appearance of a "shower of blood," as this natural phe- 

 nomenon is commonly called. 



Showers of blood have been recorded by historians and 

 poets as preternatural — have been considered in the light of 

 prodigies, and regarded where they have happened as fearful 

 prognostics of impending evils. 



There are two passages in Homer, which, however poeti- 

 cal, are applicable to a rain of this kind ; and among the 

 prodigies which took place after the death of the great 

 dictator, Ovid particularly mentions a shower of blood : 



Sajpe faces visas mecliis ardere sub astris, 

 Ssepe inter nimbos guttee cecidere cruentae. 



With tlireatening signs the lowering skies were fiU'd, 

 And sanguine drops from murky clouds distilled. 



Among the nurherous prodigies reported by Livy to have 

 happened in the year 214 B.C., it is instanced that, at Man- 

 tua, a stagnating piece of water, caused by the overflowing 

 of the River Mincius, appeared as of blood ; and, in the 

 cattle-market at Rome, a shower of blood fell in the Istrian 

 Street. After mentioning several other remarkable phe- 

 nomena tiiat happened during that year, Livy concludes by 

 saying that these prodigies were expiated, confornii'bly to 

 the answers of the Aruspices, by victims of the greater 

 kinds, and supplication was ordered to be performed to all 

 (216) 



