700 



INSECTS ABROAD. 



The ground colour of the upper wings is sooty brown, with a 

 glossy silky surface, and upon it are a number of lines of shining 

 „:vy glossed with gold. The lower wings are orange, with a 

 spot and broad edging of a colour which at first sight appears 

 to be black, but is really of the deepest purple, with a velvet- 

 like texture. Only two species of this genus are as yet known, 

 and both of them are Australian. 



1 v^: 



&*m 



There is a small and most splendid group of Pyralidas called 

 Margarodhhe, or Pearl Moths, because the ground colour of their 



wings is exactly like 

 mother-of-pearl both in 

 colour and in iridescence. 

 It is scarcely possible to 

 imagine anything more 

 magnificently dazzling 

 than a collection of these 

 Moths, one of the largest 

 of which is the present 

 species, a native of Do- 

 mingo. 



The ground colour of 

 the upper pair of wings 

 is rich deep metallic 

 purple, washed with 

 green, and, as is often 

 the case with insects, 

 there are some lights in which it looks simple dark brown. 

 Upon this wing are drawn three bars of lustrous, opalescent 

 pearl. This latter colour forms the ground hue of the lower 

 wings, whose only other adornment is an edging of the same 

 deep metallic purple as that of the upper wings. The thorax is 

 mottled black and white, and the abdomen is barred with the 

 same colour, thus accounting for the generic name, which 

 signifies " Wolf-Tiger." 



One of the most curious of the group is Phdkellura hyali- 

 notatis, of South America. With outspread wings it is very 

 triangular in shape, and the wings are glossy in the middle, 

 with an edging of gold-brown. The tail is ornamented With a 

 tuft of diverging oar-shaped hairs, almost exactly resembling 





Fig. 48G.— Lypotigris reginuiis. 

 (Pearl ami purple. ) 



