68 PEACOCK. 



the other, Avhich latter forms the inside of a large patch, angu- 

 lar on its inner side, and rounded on its outer one, which is, 

 as it were, partially eclipsed by a large eye, whose ground 

 colour is yellowish buff, and within whose orbit are marks of 

 black and purple red, with a border of blue spots, and three 

 pale blue specks, followed by two others outride it. It is much 

 in the form of the handle of "Charles's Wain," the always 

 well-known constellation that j^uides the traveller by shewing- 

 him unerringly the north, a beacon which, as the church spire 

 points upwards to raise the mind towards Heaven for the 

 journey thither, directs by a downward indication the earthly 

 j)llgrimage of many a benighted wanderer both by sea and 

 land. "God is great," says the Moslem, and verily the Moslem 

 speaks true in his saying. Great He is, in the stars of Heaven, 

 those unknown worlds of illimitable space, and great, ecj^ually 

 great, in the humble though beautiful insect before us. 



The outer margin of the wings is brown, and their front edge 

 is striated on the inner half with streaks of dark yellowish 

 and black. 



The hind wings are also reddish brown on the central and 

 hinder parts of their surflxce; the base being brown, studded 

 with innumerable specks of yellow dust, and the outside bor- 

 der brown: near the outer corner is a very large eye surrounded 

 with a colour which approaches more nearly to Avhite than any 

 other, and it is bounded on its inside with blackish brown. The 

 eye itself is black, with live blue specks in it — two, two, and one. 



Underneath, the fore wings are dark brown, streaked across 

 with an infinity of darker marks, some wider, some narrower, 

 and some of deeper shades than others. 



The hind wings are of a darker ground colour than the fore 

 ones, striated in the same way, and across their centre is one 

 large waved bar formed by dark edges, and in its centre an 

 obscure yellowish white dot. 



The caterpillar is gregarious in its habits, black, spined, 

 spotted with white, and the hind legs are red. 



The chrvsalis is indented, of a greenish colour, and dotted 

 with R'old. 



