38o 



Marvels of Insect Life* 



of another species^ hang together as a red bunch on the twigs of their food-plant. 

 They change into stout, oval chrysalids with divided heads. 



Although these butterflies are highly esteemed in collections for their size and 

 magnificent colouring, and have consequently been much hunted by assiduous 

 collectors, Kaye says that some of the woods — the morphos are purely forest Insects 

 — in South Brazil teem with them, just as Bates described them at the time of his 

 exploration of the Amazons country to the north. The latter says :" Morphos are 

 among the most conspicuous of the Insect denizens of Tropical American forests." 



We will content ourselves with brief notes on the species whose photographs 

 appear as illustrations. The difficulty in referring to them is that they have no 

 popular names ; but as the scientific names are mostly derived from those of persons. 



Photo by] [E. Stcf, F.L.S. 



Sulskowsky's Butterfly. 

 The beautiful under side of this comparatively small morpho is shown in this photograph. Its colouring consists of a marbling of pale 

 brown and brownish-white, diversified with ring-spots. The upper side is pearly pale blue, with brown tips to the fore-wings and little 

 tails to the hind-wings. It measures four and a quarter inches across the fore-wings. 



real and mythical, these will be more or less familiar words to the general reader. 

 The Venus '^ is a Central American species which measures five and a quarter 

 inches across the spread fore-wings, which are of a brilliant glossy blue with a broken 

 band of white across the middle and a line of six smaller white spots between it 

 and the hinder edge of the wing. The hind-wings are of similar colours, but here 

 the white band is unbroken and the smaller spots are more or less crescent shaped. 

 The under side is a beautiful arrangement of irregular spots, blotches, and eye-marks 

 in pale chocolate and white. The cacique ^ measures six and a half inches across, 

 and is of deep blue with a row of white spots near the margin of the fore-wings ; 

 whilst the inner margins of the hind-wings, which lap the body of the butterfly, 



^ Morpho epistrophus. - M. cypris. ' M. cacica. 



