THE TRIBE OF THE COPPERS £53 



While some of the Coppers are very abundant, the 

 majority are rather rare. Only a few species are suffi- 

 ciently widely distributed to require description here. 



The Wanderer 



Feniseca tarquinius 



In many orders of insects there are whole famihes 

 whose larvae are habitually carnivorous, feeding entirely 

 upon other kinds of insects. This is especially so in case 

 of the beetles, the flies, the true bugs, and the great order 

 to wliich the bees and wasps belong. Among the scale- 

 winged insects, however, carnivorous caterpillars are rare, 

 seldom occurring among the moths and in hardly more 

 than one species among the butterflies. This one excep- 

 tion is the modest-looking little butterfly fancifully called 

 the Wanderer, perhaps because instead of frequenting 

 the flowery fields where other butterflies congregate it 

 wanders in and out among the alders by brooks and ponds, 

 alighting oftener upon a leaf or tw^ig than upon a flower — ■ 

 the latter apparently lacking for it the attraction it has 

 for other butterflies. 



If you watch one of these copper-hued creatures for 

 awhile, however, you will soon see that its wandering 

 is not aimless but has rather a method all its own. Per- 

 haps you will see it alight upon an alder twig on or above 

 which you are likely to notice curious woolly white ex- 

 crescences. If you are close enough you will probably 

 see the butterfly uncoil its tongue and sip up a liquid on 

 twig or leaf — the exudations of the woolly aphids that 

 make up the supposed excrescence and suck the sap from 



