MR. W. 8S. MACLEAY ON THE NATURAL HISTORY OF URANIA. 185 
the slightest harm. I have somewhere indeed read that its cotyledons preserve a portion 
of the emetic and purgative power of the nut of a Jatropha ; but all I can say is, that I 
never heard of the nuts of Omphalea triandra injuring any of the persons whom I have 
seen eat them; and my mouth, when parched, having many a time and oft derived re- 
freshment from a due discussion of its produce, I shall always view this plant and the 
Cacti, or Prickly Pears, with a sort of gratitude, as being among the few hospitable 
vegetables which adorn that most scorching of all sublunary regions,—a sandy sea 
coast in the West Indies. 
The Omphalea triandra! is a tree which I have seen as high as fifteen feet, but the 
trunk is in that case very thick in proportion to its height. This trunk is excessively 
gnarled, and the branches are also rugged, drooping downwards, and supporting on 
long footstalks large thick heart-shaped leaves of a leathery texture, and which have a 
scabrous surface of a pale green colour, and are not in the least degree shining. The 
young leaves, and the leaves of the young plants, are of a quite different form, being, 
although of the same texture and colour as those just described, deeply incised, with 
their divisions long and narrow, particularly the middle one, and all more or less den- 
tated at the sides. As on the same plant we see the two kinds of leaves, the older ones 
below and entire, and the younger above and incised, it would appear to me that these 
incisions gradually fill up, and so form the mature and heart-shaped leaf. 
Now the upper side of the entire leaves of this tree may often be observed to be coated 
in the middle by a transparent web, through which appears a caterpillar torpidly re- 
posing under cover. At night, however, our caterpillar, no longer sluggish, quits the 
silky shed which served to protect it from the powerful rays of the-sun, and greedily 
strips the Omphalea of its foliage, so that I have often seen whole trees without a leaf. 
This caterpillar is also active in the day-time when disturbed from under its web. It 
can then run about as quick as the larva of any Bombycide, and shows little affinity to 
the caterpillars of other diurnal Lepidoptera, which usually have a slow motion. 
Having carried some of these caterpillars home, I supplied them for some days with 
fresh food, when they spun about the withered or dead leaves in the box an oval cocoon 
of a loose dirty yellow silk. Within this cocoon, the meshes of which were so few and 
lax as to allow the inmate to be easily seen, it changed to a chrysalis, which, after 
about three weeks repose in a horizontal position, produced, to my great satisfaction, a 
beautiful specimen of Urania. Since that time I have bred several. 
In February, and the ensuing months of spring and summer, that is, as long as the 
Omphalea continues throwing out young shoots, the egzs of Urania may be found glued 
to the tender incised leaves. These eggs have a pearly lustre, and are of a pale green 
‘ In Browne’s Jamaica it is called Omphalandria in the text; and a figure of it is given, which is as unlike 
to the Cuban plant as anything well can be. May not this Cuban plant, therefore, be a different species? For 
my own part, however, I doubt it exceedingly. 
