THE 



BUTTERFLIES OF NEW ENGLAND. 



INTRODUCTION. 



I. 



THE GENERAL STRUCTURE OF BUTTERFLIES. 



Kcix'iit? Xot I. llepeutence is the weight 



Of iiuligesteil meals eat yesterday. 



'Tis for large animals tliat gorge "on prey, 



Not for a honey-sipping Inittcrtly. 



I am a thing of rhyme and rcduiidillas, 



The momentary rainliow on the spray 



IMade hy the thundering torrent of men's lives: 



No matter whether I am here or there ; 



I still cateh sunheams. 



George Eliot.— T/^e Spanish G>jpsy. 



THE word Initterriy is a popular term for a few of the higher families of 

 scaly-winged insects, or Lepidoptera. Although for many years sys- 

 tematic writers have frequently used the terms Papilionidae, Rhopalocera, 

 Globidicornes or Achalinoptera with similar signification, the group is not 

 a natural one, — that is, as an assemblage of lepidopterous insects, it has 

 no equivalents of equal value and weight. The grouping is simply a con- 

 venience, not the expression of a natural division. The four families of 

 scaly-winged insects which are thus assembled may, however, be usually 

 distinguished in their perfect state from the other families by the thickening 

 of the tips of their antennae, so as to make the latter appear more or less 

 clulibed ; also by the total absence of any lateral appendages to the separate 

 antennal joints ; and by the want of a bristle-like extension of the costal ner- 

 vurc of the hind wings, by which it is caught to the front pair, — all which 

 features obtain in the majority of other Lepidoptera. They differ also, but 

 in a very general way only, in habits, butterflies usually holding their wings 

 erect when not in use, almost invariably flying only by day, and in their 

 transformations seldom spinning any cocoon, the hinder end of the chrysalis 

 being provided with little hooks by which a firm hold is had of a button 

 of silk s[)un beforehand to cling to ; while other Lepidoptera generally fly 



