IN CERTAIN LEPIDOPTEEA. 269 



from its adhesion to the valve-cavity with the same knife-point. I do not always suc- 

 ceed ; but if I do, I have an object, often of brilliant transparency and lustre, and of 

 extreme delicacy, which I can put on a slip of glass, and transfer to the stage of a 

 compound microscope, using any powers that I please. 



The organs which project from the abdominal cavity cannot be detached with certainty 

 of success. These, therefore, I usually view with the; lens only*. After exhaustive study 

 of these parts, dry, since the scaphium and, in part, the penis are composed of soft tissues 

 which change form in drying, I introduce into the cavity, with the tip of a fine hair-pencil, 

 a drop of clear water. This is presently absorbed ; the superfluous water is removed 

 with a point of blotting-paper, and the organs are again examined as before. The shri- 

 velled parts have now become much more plump, assuming something approaching the 

 form which they had daring life. The study of them in this condition often reveals facts 

 that had been obscure before. 



On detaching a valve there are often found many plume-scales and atoms of meconium, 

 scattered over the organs within, as well as all about, the anal cavity. Since these 

 hinder distinct vision, I remove them by touching the parts with the tip of a fine camel's- 

 hair pencil slightly moistened, wiping the tip on a linen cloth after every contact. 



Curious records of past history may be read in such impediments. Minute fragments 

 of a pulverulent, drab-coloured, chalky substance are, as I have observed, occasionally 

 found adhering to the harpes. On one occasion I found, on carefully removing one of 

 the valves from a cabinet-specimen of Omithoptera ffliadamanthus <3 , the cavity quite 

 full of this substance, partly in coarse powder, and partly in somewhat coherent lumps 

 of the size of mustard-seed downwards. Now, I have no doubt that this male had 

 effected coitus with a female, at so early a period after her evolution from pupa, that she 

 had not discharged the faecal accumulation of the pupa stage, which subsists " sous la 

 forme d'un fluide jaune ou bruu, comparable an meconium des enfants nouveau-iiL'S " 

 (Burmeister). The excitement of the sexual copula would provoke the instant discharge 

 of the meconium, a large portion of which would fill the valvular cavity of the graspin"- 

 male; and this, presently coagulating, remained to be at leugth revealed by my dissect- 

 ing scalpel. 



A phenomenon exactly similar occurred with a specimen of JPapilio Zalmoxis. But in 

 this case the cavity was occupied with a dirty mingled mass of meconium and body-scales ; 

 and that so fully as completely to conceal all the organs, till it was gradually extracted. 

 These scales were surely those of a female abdomen, removed in coilu: the meconium 

 discharged at the same time had agglutinated the scales into a composite mass, which, 

 in drying, had divided into fragments and coarse powder; and these, the male having 

 been presently captured, had remained a record of the history. 



See also, for similar conditions, the account of Papilio Action, and of not a few other 

 species. 



The illustrative drawings have all been made, not with the aid of the camera, but by 

 the eye and hand alone. They have not been drawn to scale ; but those of the valves 



* I have occasionally viewed these as opaque objects under condensed reflected light both artificial and solar; 

 but the result has been (in general, though with exceptions) hardly worth the pains. 



