SUBFAMILY NYMPHALIN/E (THE NYMPHS) 



" Entomology extends the limits of being in new directions, so that I walk in 

 nature with a sense of greater space and freedom. It suggests, besides, that the 

 universe is not rough-hewn, but perfect in its details. Nature will bear the closest 

 inspection; she invites us to lay our eye level with the smallest leaf and take an 

 insect view of its plane." — Thoreau. 



" My butterfly-net and pocket magnifying-glass are rare companions for a walk 

 in the country." — William Hamilton Gibson, Sharp Eyes, p. 117. 



Butterfly. — The butterflies of this subfamily are mainly of 

 moderate or large size, though some of the genera contain quite 

 small species. The antennae are always more or less heavily 

 clothed with scales, and are usually as long as the abdomen, and 

 in a few cases even longer. The club is always well developed; 

 it is usually long, but in some genera is short and stout. The 

 palpi are short and stout, densely clothed with scales and hairs. 

 The thorax is relatively stout, in some genera exceedingly so. 

 The fore wings are relatively broad, the length being to the breadth 

 in most cases in the ratio of 5 to 3, or 3 to 2, though in a few 

 mimetic forms these wings are greatly produced, and narrow, 

 patterning after the outline of the Heliconians and Ithomiids, which 

 they mimic. The fore wings are in most genera produced at the 

 apex, and more or less strongly excavated on the outer margin 

 below the apex. The discoidal cell is usually less than half the 

 length of the wing from base to tip. It is occasionally open, but 

 is more generally closed at its outer extremity by discocellular 

 veins diminishing in thickness from the upper to the lower outer 

 angle of the cell. The costal nervure usually terminates midway 

 between the end of the cell and the tip. The two inner subcostal 

 nervules usually arise before the end of the cell; the outer sub- 

 costal nervules invariably arise beyond the end of the cell. 



The hind wings are rounded or angulated, with the outer 



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