JUNE. 193 



elegant and beautiful ; it is quite common, and is fond of 

 settling on flowers, especially Syngenesia, by roadsides, &c. 

 where it may easily be caught. It continues with us till 

 the latter part of September or October. 



C. — Another little butterfly, but of humbler pretensions 

 has likewise appeared. It is the Yellow-spotted Skipper 

 (Hesperia Peckius), 



F. — The family of butterflies known by the name of 

 Skippers, have in the thickness and clumsiness of their 

 bodies,' as much resemblance to moths as to butterflies. I 

 have sometimes amused myself by tracing the close affinities 

 which exist between members of tribes, that appear at first 

 sight widely different, and by observing the very minute gra- 

 dations by which nature delights to step from one to another. 

 Let us look at a few of these in the organs of flight ; besides 

 the thickness of body just alluded to, what a close resem- 

 blance of shape is there between the wings of the Hesperice 

 and the NoctucB, so that when dead and expanded, it would 

 not be easy for a young naturalist to tell whether the speci- 

 men were a butterfly or a moth. On the other hand, an 

 equally close similarity exists between the GeometrcB and 

 butterflies : the delicacy of form and breadth of wing is the 

 same ; the butterfly flies by day, the geometra does the 

 same ; the buttei'fly erects its wings when at rest ; nothing 

 is more common than to see a geometra with closed erected 

 wings : here we have resemblance in points, which are con- 

 sidered generic distinctions. How closely do the Hawk- 

 moths approach the PhalcencB, through the subdivision 

 ZygcBna ! But for a far closer affinity, and between orders 

 apparently very remote from each other, look at Lepidoptera 

 and Hymenoptera. So exactly do many of the hawk-moths 

 of the division Mgeria resemble hymenopterous flies, that 

 even an entomologist may be deceived at the distance of not 

 more than a yard. The transparent wings, often with 



K 



