329 MODERN CLASSIFICATION OF INSECTS. 
yellow spots, live upon laurels, especially the sassafras ; those of the 
group typified by P. Thoas or P. Agavus feed upon the orange tree. 
The species of ‘Thais are appropriated to the Aristolochia, and the 
Parnassii (Doritis) to the Saxifrages. Pieris attacks the Crucifere ; 
Colias, the herbaceous Leguminose ; Danais, the Asclepiadezx ; Heli- 
conides, the Passiflore ; Argynnis, the violet ; and Hipparchia, the 
Graminee. 
The geographical distribution of this order has been but little 
studied. Dependent as its species are almost exclusively upon the 
vegetable world, the same rules which regulate the latter will of course 
to a great degree apply to the former; and whilst particular tribes 
affect peculiar situations in a given country (as, for instance, Doritis 
mountainous districts), where peculiar tribes of plants are found, other 
tribes of great extent frequent other countries to which the tribes of 
plants to which they are attached are especially confined ; thus, the 
Heliconides do not occur out of South America, the country of the 
Passifloraceze : Castina and Erycina are also (almost exclusively ) in- 
habitants of the same country. The gigantic Ornithopteri inhabit 
the islands of the Indian Archipelago, whilst the nearly equal-sized 
Morphos are natives of Brazil. Africa, owing to its arid soil and far- 
spread sand deserts, is but poor in the diurnal species, whilst South 
America, owing to exuberance in vegetable life, abounds with them, 
so that it may be considered that at least one third of the diurnal 
Lepidoptera are natives of that portion of the New World. Owing, 
probably, to this dependence upon the distribution of vegetables, cer- 
tain species as well as genera are on the other hand Cosmopolites : 
thus, whilst Cynthia cardui occurs throughout Europe, Senegal, 
Egypt, Barbary, Cape of Good Hope, the Islands of Mauritius, and 
Madagascar, China, Bengal, Java, New Holland, Brazil, and North 
America, Vanessa Antiopa and Atalanta, Lycana Phleas, &c., are 
also very widely extended through the northern hemisphere, and 
some genera, such as the beautiful Deiopeiz, are natives of almost 
every region. Itis, however, by the publication of local Faunas, that 
we shall be best enabled to obtain a correct view of this subject, and 
therefore too much praise cannot be given to the compilation of such 
articles as Keferstein’s observations on the ‘‘Apparition des Lépidop- 
tires” (Rév. Entomol. No. 10.), Hess, On the Lepidoptera of the Alps, 
Beske’s Catalogue of Hamburg Lepidoptera, Bory St. Vincent's Le- 
pidoptera of the Canary Isles, Fridvalsky’s Lepidoptera of Hungary, 
