CHAPTEK VII. 



HABITS. 



IN the preceding chapters we have discussed the 

 external frame- work and the internal organization 

 of butterflies. We now leave these rather dry 

 details, and proceed to a more interesting topic, 

 the Life of butterflies. Here, as in the lives of 

 men, we shall find that " all the world's a stage," 

 and in this moving drama of life shall discern 

 the same struggles for existence, the same survival 

 of the fittest, although not the exhibition of such 

 varied passions, as in human history. We shall 

 see how the diverse relations of butterflies to 

 their environment are proofs of the moulding 

 power of these unseen forces. That this should 

 be so is hardly surprising when we consider that 

 they are openly exposed to all the varied influ- 

 ences of their surroundings under four entirely 

 different structural forms ; and that although 

 they are active in only two of these, yet they 

 then differ so widely in both life and organiza- 

 tion that, if the relation between them had never 

 been traced, it could never have been surmised. 

 So far, therefore, as their lives are concerned, we 

 must treat the caterpillar and the butterfly much 



