ORDER I1V.-——-MOTHS AND BUTTERFLIES. 211 
The Genus Danaus. 
This is another genus of the Lepidoptera diurna, and a 
large and numerous family of beautiful butterflies. Our 
limits will not allow us more than to give their general 
characteristics, and to describe one species, which is very 
common in this country as elsewhere, and which may be 
considered a type of the whole. The butterflies of this ge- 
nus are distinguished from all others by their large, round 
wings, of a dark-red color, veined with black, and their long, 
knobbed antenne. ‘Their caterpillars are smooth, of a cy- 
lindrical form, as also is their chrysalis, which is green, or- 
namented with several golden spots. ‘These insects feed 
principally upon the poisonous leaves of the different spe- 
cies of milk-weed (asclepias), and are found in all countries 
where these plants grow, which is the case in Napth and 
South America, Africa, China, Hindostan, and Australia. 
One of the handsomest and most common of this genus is 
The BERENICE (Danaus Berenice), Fig. 55. ~On account 
Figure 55. 
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The Berenice. 
of its beauty, this butterfly was named Berenice, after the 
wife of Antiochus, King of Syria, universally considered the 
loveliest woman of her age. It has dark-red wings, with 
