18 



LIFE HISTOEY AND HABITS. 



tlie big cliang'e takes jalace ; for this it jireiDares by hauging" itself in a 

 convenient place, out of the way of enemies, etc., and becomes the 

 chrysalis. During this period an internal transformation takes place 

 and the tissues of the caterpillar build up the butterfly. There is no 

 process akin to this in any domestic animal with which we are familiar ; 

 every part of the caterpillar is built up anew ; the internal organs are 

 remodelled; wings are formed; long legs take the place of the short 

 caterpillar legs ; the biting jaws of the caterpillar have been thrown off 

 and the long tubular proboscis of the butterfly is formed ; new compound 

 eyes are formed ; new sense organs appear. Further, the entire repro- 

 ductive system of the butterfly is built up and formed. Only the 

 beginnings of a reproductive system are to be found in the caterpillar, but' 

 a more or less complete and complex system of rej)roductive organs, male 

 or female, is formed during this stage. When, at the end of six days, 

 the butterfly within is fully formed, it emerges; the skin is soft, the 

 wings soft and folded up; in a short time the wings expand, become 

 hard and dry ; the body takes on firmness, the legs become stiff, and the 

 butterfly is ready to fly away, with new senses, new instincts, to suck 

 the nectar from the flowers, to find its mate and to flutter gaily in the 

 sunshine — a change as great as we can imagine from the crawling 

 caterpillar that hung itself up six days before. 



The life of all insects is not exactly similar to that of the butterfly, 

 and we may take the life of a grasshopper as an example of what changes 

 take place in some other insects. 



Fig. 25. 

 Iig(j mass detiic//('i/, 



Fig. 20. 

 lEf/ff 'jiiass in ff round. 



