INTRODUCTION. xliii 



Scales are not the only covering of the wings of Lepidoptera. 

 The edges of the wings in most cases are bordered with a row 

 of short hairs, sometimes of a different colour to the rest of the 

 wing, especially between the nervures. These are called the 

 fringes or cilia of the wings, and in many of the smaller Moths, 

 especially those allied to the Clothes Moths, they are very long. 

 More or lessof the baseof thewingsof Butterflies is often covered 

 with long hair ; and in many of the larger foreign Butterflies the 

 inner margin of the hind-wings forms a long deep fold, filled 

 with fluffy hair. But apart from this, the inner-margin of the 

 wings in Butterflies is often fringed with much longer hair than 

 the hind-margin. 



The abdomen in the Lepidoptera is composed of nine seg- 

 ments. It is frequently crested on the back, and tufted at the 

 extremity in Moths. In Butterflies, the males are sometimes 

 furnished with large clasping organs at the extremity, or have 

 the power of protruding scent-tufts from the abdomen ; in the 

 females of Moths an ovipositor is occasionally present. 



On the Wings and Neuration of Butterflies. 



The wings of insects are traversed by hollow tubes, which are 

 technically called nervures, and which serve first as circulatory 

 organs for the fluid which is forced through the wings on the 

 emergence of the insect from the pupa, and thus causes their 

 expansion and development ; and afterwards as air-tubes, and 

 as ribs to strengthen the wings and to keep them expanded. 

 In many insects, including some Moths, but not in Butterflies, 

 these ribs fold together like a fan, and in beetles, &c, the ends 

 are folded back again. These nervures, differ much in their 

 number and arrangement, not only in different orders, but 

 even in allied groups of the same order ; and form a valuable 

 aid to classification. We will now proceed to give a short 

 account of their usual arrangement in Butterflies, with the aid 



