154 BRITISH BUTTERFLIES 



CHAPTEE XIII 



THE FRITILLARIES, VANES S AS, AND THE PURPLE 

 EMPEROR 



Family NYMPHALID^ 



WE now come to a rather large family, which contains some of our 

 largest and most brilliant butterflies. Some of them display the 

 most gaudy colours, and others exhibit patches of a beautiful metal- 

 lic lustre. 



If you were to see all the members of this family side by side, 

 they might strike you as being so varied in their appearance that 

 you would wonder why they are all placed in one family group. 

 But, were you to see, in addition to the perfect insects, all their 

 larvae and chrysalides, the reason would be made clear at once, for 

 these earlier stages are seen to resemble each other in certain points 

 at the very first glance. The former are all provided with peculiar 

 spines, and the latter are all more or less angular, and are all sus- 

 pended to a silken carpet by means of hooks at the tip of the abdo- 

 men, and have no belt as we have observed in the case of the 

 Pieridce. 



The perfect insects, too, although so varied in colouring, are 

 alike in that they have only four walking legs, the first pair being 

 so imperfectly developed as to be useless for this purpose. 



This family includes the Fritillaries and the Vanessas. 



The Small Pearl-bordered Fritillary (Argynnis Selene) 



The interesting group of butterflies known as the Fritillaries 

 vary considerably in size, but are remarkably uniform in the 

 ground colour of the wings, which, in all cases, is a rich golden or 

 sienna brown ; and this ground is chequered with darker colours in 

 such a manner as to remind one of the petals of the wild flower 



