MEANS OF DEFENCE OF INSECTS. 219 



a little withered, pale, crumpled leaf, eaten as it were by 

 caterpillars, fluttering from the tree. The sight appeared 

 to him so very extraordinary, that he left his place of 

 shelter to contemplate it more nearly ; and could scarcely 

 believe his eyes, when he beheld a living insect, in shape 

 and colour resemblino; a fragment of a withered leaf with 

 the edges turned up and eaten away as it were by cater- 

 pillars, and at the same time all over beset with prickles*. 

 — A British insect, one of our largest moths [Gastro- 

 •pacha quercifolia\ called by collectors the Lappet-moth, 

 affords an example from the Lepidoptera order of the 

 imitation in question, its wings repjesenting, both in 

 shape and colour, an arid brown leaf. Some bugs, be- 

 longing to the genus Dictyonota of Mr. Curtis ^, simu- 

 late portions of leaves in a still further state of decay, 

 when the veins only are left. For, the thorax and elytra 

 of these insects being reticulated, with the little areas or 

 meshes of the net-work transparent, this circumstance 

 gives them exactly the appearance of small fragments of 

 skeletons of leaves. 



But you have probably heard of most of these species 

 of imitation : I hope, therefore, you will give credit to 

 the two instances to which I shall next call your atten- 

 tion, of insects that even mimic flowers and fruit. With 

 respect to the former, I recollect to have seen in a col- 

 lection made by Mr. Masson at the Cape of Good Hope, 

 a species of the orthopterous genus Pncumora, the elytra 

 of which were of a rose- or pink-colour, which shrowd- 

 ing its vesiculose abdomen, gave it much the appearance 

 of a fine flower — A most beautiful and brilliant beetle, 

 of the genus Chlamijs, {Ch. Dacca,) found by Captain 

 * Voyage, &c. ii. 16. " Brit. Ent. I. 154. 



