3050 



THE JOINTED ANIMALS 



foreign forms, we reach the subfamily Morphince, in which the caterpillars are re- 

 markable for their bifurcate tail and notched or bifid head. The species of the typical 

 genus are giant butterflies of almost every hue, the most conspicuous being of a 

 dazzling metallic sky blue. Their long, satiny wings bear them aloft far out of 

 the reach of the collector's net. In the preceding illustration is figured, from the 

 tinder side, the resplendent ptolemy {Morpho neoptolemus) . The upper side is rich 

 black brown, with broad transverse blue bands, shot with delicate lilac across both 

 wings. A pair of white spots are conspicuous on the tip of the fore-wing. 



We have now to briefly notice a number of much less brightly-colored 

 butterflies, many of which will be familiar to most readers, forming the subfamily 

 Satyrincz. They include the ringlets {Erebia} , speckled woods (Pararge) , marbled 

 whites (Melanargia] , meadow browns and heaths (Epinephele and Ccenonympha) , 

 wall-browns (Satyrus}, graylings and common wood ringlet (Hipparchia) , and many 

 others. The caterpillars are mostly smooth, fusiform, and green, having two 

 horns on the head and a bifurcate tail. They feed on grasses. These butterflies fly 

 somewhat feebly over meadows, downs, highlands, and heath districts. As an 

 example of the typical genus Satyrus may be taken the common British wall-brown 



(S. megreea). Here the wings are rufous 

 brown, spotted, speckled, and streaked 

 with black, having also a single eye-like 

 spot on the upper wing at the tip, and 

 three on each lower wing, near the 

 margin. As a rarity, collectors prize a 

 specimen in which the fore-wing spots 

 are bipupilled, or having twin pale 

 centres. Of the graylings {Hipparchia}, 

 the British H. semele is abundant in the 

 heath and mountainous districts of 

 England. Owing to its beautifully 

 gray-mottled under side, it is absolutely 

 invisible when settled upon rocks or 

 among the gray stones of the moorlands. The nearly-allied meadow browns and 

 heaths {Epinephele}, which do not present a very great number of species, are most 

 abundant in the Mediterranean region and Western Asia. They fall into two 

 groups, of which E. janira is a good example of the one, while E. tithonus, the large 

 heath or gatekeeper, illustrates the other. The former, which is the commonest of 

 British butterflies, abounds in fields and meadows in the summer, ceasing to fly the 

 moment the sunbeams are obscured by a passing cloud. Specimens with pale 

 patches on the wings are valued by lovers of varieties. The upper figures on p. 3048 

 represent the adult and caterpillar. 



WAH-BROWN. 



(Natural size.) 



Family 



This small family, of w^hich the characteristics are given on p. 3048, includes 

 species chiefly found in the Tropics. Erycina aulestes of Brazil is peculiar in having 



