132 ON A NEW SPECIES OF OENITHOPTERA, 



" and pai'tly on the perfect insect. We attach the greatest 

 " importance to the caterpillar state, and the characters which it 

 " furnishes have often more value in our estimation, than those 

 " afforded by the butterfly." " It is not mei'ely from the fruit 

 " that botanists obtain their characters, but likewise from the 

 " flower, and even from the fii'st development of the vegetable 

 " embryo. The flower is to the plant what the caterpillar is to 

 " the lepidopteron, and the difierent modes of metamorphosis 

 " have as much value as those of inflorescence." 



In the vai'ious published lists of the Ornithoptera we find 

 that in most instances either the males or females only are 

 known, and each therefore constitutes a new species, and in this 

 uncertainty we must remain until the doubts are cleared away by 

 the foregoing process. In the meantime as we do not know the 

 male, and have carefully compared our insect with the females 

 described or delineated in Cramer, Donovan, Boisduval, Duncan, 

 Felder, and the British Museum Catalogues, we must consider 

 the " Cassandra'^ to be a new species, as it differs from all the 

 others by the following distinctive markings, viz., on the upper 

 surface of the primary wings, by the impure white mark in the 

 discoidal cell being parted into three distinct irregular longitu- 

 dinal patches : by that one placed between the 5th sub-costal 

 and 1st discoidal nervules separating into two instead of being- 

 entire or containing a black spot in the centre : by possessing in 

 the disc only one spot which lies between the 2nd and ord 

 median nervules : and by the almost absence of those spots 

 which run parallel to the outer margin, so distinctly seen in all 

 the other species. Of tJie secondary ivings, by the wedge or tear 

 shaped patches being more slender and exhibiting a broader 

 dark space adjoining the nervules, while the dark fuscous spots 

 in the centre of each are larger, and connect in the disc towards 

 the 1st and 3rd median nervules, and not towards the outer 

 margin of the wing. To these general distinctions may be added 

 others which will assist in separating our insect further from 

 those individuals which are most closely allied to it : thus, the 

 large wedge shaped markings on the secondary wings are three 

 in number as in the 0. Euphorion only ; the thorax presents a 

 central line of metallic green, similar to that of the 0. Pronomtis 

 and 0. Archideus, but not seen in the 0. Priamus, 0. Eichmondia, 



