AND THEIR TRANSFORMATIONS. 35 
characteristics, however, consist in the very short fore feet in both sexes, which are quite unfitted for walking, and in 
the chrysalides being simply suspended by the tail. The antenne have the extremities generally furnished with 
a more or less distinct club, which is never hooked ; the hind legs have only a simple pair of spurs at the extremity 
of the tibiew, and the posterior wings have a goove to receive the abdomen. There is scarcely any variation in 
the arrangement of the veims of the wings throughout the genera of this family, if we except the more or 
less complete closing of the discoidal cell of the hind wings. The caterpillars are variable in their structure, but 
in general they are clothed with numerous strong spines; others have the body smooth with the head or 
tail forked. The chrysalides are naked, and often armed with small conical protuberances. They are also often 
ornamented with golden or silvery spots. It will be observed that, by the arrangement of the butterflies here 
adopted, the Papilionide are far removed from the Lyczenide, which agree together in the girthed condition of the 
chrysalis, and in the fore feet being fitted like the others for walking. | M. Boisduval has endeavoured to obviate 
this objection by introducing the Lycznide between the Papilionide and Heliconiide, whilst Dr. Horsfield has 
commenced the arrangement of the butterflies with the Lyczenide, followed by the Papilionide. As, however, I 
consider the Papilionide as the types of the Diurnal Lepidoptera, and consequently as most worthy to be placed at 
the head of the section; and as there certainly exists a natural transition from the Papilionide to the Heliconiide 
and Nymphalidz (see my Introduction to Mod. Classif. of Insects, v. 2, p. 8342—353), I have adopted the 
arrangement of Stephens and other English authors. Some of the genera of this family recede from the others 
in having the club of the antennz slender and very gradually formed, the larvee smooth, with an anal fork and the 
pupa smooth. These have been separated by Dr. Horsfield as one of the five primary groups of butterflies ; but the 
genera thus characterised, Apatura, Hipparchia, &c., possess so few characters in common, and are in other respects 
so closely allied to the typical Nymphalide, that it is not material, in a work of such confined limits as the 
present, to separate them therefrom. 


GENUS IX. 
MELITAA*, Fasnicius. 
This genus is distinguished from the majority of the family by the very large and flattened club of the 
antenne and the naked eyes. The palpi are long, ascending, and wider apart at the tip than at the base. The 
second joint is by far the largest, the third joint being small but variable in shape. The head is of moderate 
size; the fore wings rather long and triangular, but with the outer margin always rounded ; the hind wings are 
rounded, and generally destitute of silvery markings. The fore legs are spurious in both sexes‘? ; the four hind 
legs are terminated by tarsi, described as having double nails, or with simple claws furnished with an unguiform 

* A fanciful name, probably derived from ped, honey, from the ground colour of the wings; or perhaps from MeArraia, the name of an 
ancient town in Thessaly. 
+ Mr. Curtis describes them as similar in the sexes, imperfect, hairy, and four or five jointed ; his pl. 386, fig. 8, represents the fore leg as very 
hairy,and 8b the tarsus as composed of three joints. The anterior tarsi, however, offer a most tangible character for the determination of the sexes. 
Their structure, now for the first time described, is as follows :—In the males they are not only very much more hairy than in the females, as 
pointed out by Zetterstedt, but entirely destitute of articulations, whilst in the females they are much less hairy, and distinctly composed of five 
joints, even without denuding them of scales, each of the joints having two short spines at the extremity on the inside. Mr. Curtis’s description 
is, therefore, that of the female, and his fig. 8 that of the male fore leg, but his fig. 8 b must, I apprehend, be erroneous. 
F2 
