TlIK I'AMII.Y IIESPEKinAE. ]367 



Chrysalis. Very simple mid romiileil, like tticseof moths, bluntly roiiiuled in every 

 sense in front, witli scarcely prominent basal wing tubercles, tlie head nearly or quite 

 as broad as the thorax, behind conical, the fifth to seventh al)doininal segments more 

 freely movable tliaii the others, and often with an encircling riilf^e. No ocellar promi- 

 nences, but occasionally a slender median frontal projection or horn; prothoracic 

 spiracles large, often protuberant, guarded by a dense mat of conical pointed tllaments. 

 Head with a transverse suture between the antennae posteriorly, marliing tlie line of 

 parting when the butterfly escapes. Cremaster slender, protuberant, depressed, the 

 hooklcts placed at tip, exceedingly long and slender, their apical half considerably 

 curved, the terminal portion thickened and curved much as in Nyinphalidae. 



This numerotis but neglected family of butterflies is well represented in 

 New England, comprising about one-third of our butterfly fauna. In- 

 deed, the New World in general is far more richly endowed with this 

 lowest type of butterflies than the Old, its metropolis being tropical 

 America, where the species are excessively numerous. The whole 

 northern continent appears to profit by this excess, for the family takes the 

 place in our butterfly fauna which the Satyrinae do in Europe. The Hes- 

 peridae, however, are represented in nearly every part of the world where 

 butterflies are found, even in the far north. 



The insects of this group are inconspicuous, generally sombre in appear- 

 ance and very uniform in structure among themselves, whether the eo-g, 

 caterpillar, chrysalis or imsigo is considered ; they diflPer, also, so consider- 

 ably from all other butterflies that they are readily recognized and have 

 very frequently been placed as a group of equal value to all other butter- 

 flies combined ; but this has resulted from the consideration not of the 

 character but of the number of the differences which separate them. Then- 

 whole body is generally very robust, and the head always broad ; the an- 

 tennae widely separated at their base and curved or crooked at the tiij ; 

 the eyes large, naked and prominent, overhung by a little tuft of curvino- 

 bristles ; the palpi almost always short (although not as in most Papilio- 

 ninae) with the middle joint greatly swollen and the last very small. 

 Between the head and thorax is a thin cushion of large, erect scales ; the 

 wings are much smaller in proportion to the bulk of the bodv than in other 

 buttei-flies, the front pair generally pointed, strong-veined, with peculiar 

 neuration, the inner margin of the hind pair always folded ; the Icf's are 

 perfect in both sexes ; the fore tibiae fiu-nishcd with an epiphysis, the hind 

 pair almost invariably with a double instead of a single pair of spin-s. 

 They are of small, or at best of but moderate size, generally with dull colors 

 in which dark brown and tawny predominate, and are often marked with 

 vitreous spots, which are more frequently angular than as in most other 

 butterflies round. The males are often provided with external signs of 

 their sex in a costal fold on the fore wings, filled with downy hairs, or in 

 velvety dashes on the same pair, in the latter case frequently accompanied 

 by large and partially erect scales ; sometimes the sexes also differ in the 

 form of the antennae, and particularly of the crook of the club. 



