CASSELUS BOOK OF 



EUROPEAN BUTTERFLIES AND MOTHS. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Butterflies and Moths belong to the order Lcpidoptcra, or Scale-winged Insects, which forms 

 part of the Class Insccta, the largest and most important division of the 'sub-kingdom Articulata, 

 or Jointed Animals. The Articulata have a symmetrically-formed body, consisting of a series of 

 parts resembling each other called segments. They have no internal bony skeleton like that of 

 vertebrate animals, but in its place an outer skin, generally like horn, but varying in hardness, to 

 which the muscles are attached, and which is frequently called an external skeleton, because it 

 thus supplies the place of the internal bony skeleton of the more highly organised animals. The 

 nervous system consists of a double row of small nervous centres, or ganglia, which are connected 

 together by two large nerve-cords running through the length of the body. Their blood is 

 generally white, and circulates through a vessel running along the back, while the nervous system 

 runs along the under portion of the body. They breathe by tracheae when they live in air, and 

 by gills when they live in water. 



The Class of Insects comprises all those articulated animals in which the body is composed of 

 three distinct parts in the perfect state, which are called head, thorax, and abdomen. Every insect 

 has also six legs when fully developed. They breathe by trachea;, that is, by air-tubes, which run 

 along the sides of the body, and which branch outwards in little openings called spiracles, and 

 inwards into the interior of the body, and more or less pervade the whole of it. Insects are 

 generally provided with wings, and pass through several changes or metamorphoses before arriving 

 at the perfect state. 



Butterflies and Moths {Lcpidoptera, or Glossata) are distinguished from other insects, in their 

 perfect state, by the organs of the mouth being formed for sucking up their food, and by the 

 presence of four membranous wings, covered with coloured scales on both sides. From these cha- 

 racters they derive their scientific appellations: Lcpidoptcra, from Xevrk, a scale, and irrepov, a wing; 

 and Glossata, from yKojaaa, the tongue. Their metamorphoses are complete ; that is, they appear 

 in three entirely different forms after leaving the egg : first as a soft -skinned caterpillar, or larva, 

 more or less resembling a worm in shape, with jaws fitted for biting; next as a chrysalis, or 

 pupa, enclosed in a horny case, and without any external organs adapted for locomotion or for 

 taking nourishment ; and finally as the perfect butterfly or moth, provided with antennae, proboscis, 

 legs, and wings, and fitted for flight and for the reproduction of its kind. They only grow in the 

 larval state ; the pupa and the fully-developed insect never increase in size. 



The beautiful forms and colours of butterflies, the intricacy of their markings, and their 



