502 



HISTORY OF INSECTS. 



differently from what it is in animals when ex- 

 cluded. 



But leaving the other parts of the butterfly, 

 let us turn our attention particularly to the 

 head. The eyes of butterflies have not all 

 the same form ; for in some they are large, in 

 others small ; in some they are the larger por- 

 tion of a sphere, in others they are but a small 

 part of it, and just appearing from the head. 

 In all of them, however, the outward coat has 

 a lustre, in which may be discovered the vari- 

 ous colours of the rainbow. When examined 

 a little closely, it will be found to have the 

 appearance of a multiplying-glass; having a 

 great number of sides or facets, in the manner 

 of a brilliant cut diamond. In this particular 

 the eye of the butterfly, and of most other in- 

 sects, entirely correspond; and Leuwenhoek 

 pretends there are about six thousand facets 

 on the cornea of the flea. These animals, 

 therefore, see not only with great clearness, 

 but view every object multiplied in a surpris- 

 ing manner. Puget adapted the cornea of a 

 fly in such a position as to see objects through 

 it by the means of a microscope ; and nothing 

 could exceed the strangeness of its representation. 

 A soldier, who was seen through it, appeared 

 like an army of pigmies ; for while it multi- 

 plied, it also diminished the object; the arch 

 of a bridge exhibited a spectacle more mag- 

 nificent than human skill could perform ; the 

 flame of a candle seemed a beautiful illumin- 

 ation. It still, however, remains a doubt, 

 whether the insect sees objects singly, as with 

 one eye ; or whether every facet is itself a 

 complete eye, exhibiting its own object distinct 

 from all the rest. 



Butterflies, as well as most other flying in- 

 sects, have two instruments, like horns, on their 

 heads, which are commonly called feelers. 

 They differ from the horns of greater animals, 

 in being movable at their base ; and in hav- 

 ing a great number of joints, by which means 

 the insect is enabled to turn them in every 

 direction. Those of butterflies are placed at 

 the top of the head, pretty near the external 

 edge of each eye. What the use of these in- 

 struments may be, which are thus formed with 

 so much art, and by a WORKMAN who does no- 

 thing without reason, is as yet unknown to 

 man. They may serve to guard the eye ; they 

 may be of use to clean it ; or they may be the 

 organ of some sense which we are ignorant of: 

 but this is only explaining one difficulty by an- 

 other. We are not so ignorant of the uses of the 

 trunk, which few insects of the butterfly kind 

 are without. This instrument is placed ex- 

 actly between the eyes ; and when the animal 

 is not employed in seeking its nourishment, it 

 is rolled up like a curl. A butterfly, when it 

 is feeding, flies round some flower and settles 

 upon it. The trunk is then uncurled, and 



thrust out either wholly or in part ; and is em. 

 ployed in searching the flower to its very bot- 

 tom, let it be ever so deep. This search being 

 repeated seven or eight times, the butterfly 

 then passes to another ; and continues to hover 

 over those agreeable to its taste, like a bird 

 over its prey. This trunk consists of two equal 

 hollow tubes, nicely joined to each other, like 

 the pipes of an organ. 



Such is the figure and conformation of these 

 beautiful insects, that cheer our walks, and 

 give us the earliest intimations of summer. 

 But it is not by day alone that they are seen 

 fluttering wantonly from flower to flower, as the 

 greatest number of them fly by night, and ex- 

 pand the most beautiful colouring at those 

 hours when there is no spectator. This tribe 

 of insects has, therefore, been divided into 

 Diurnal and Nocturnal Flies ; or, more pro- 

 perly speaking, into Butterflies and Moths : 

 the one flying only by day, the other most 

 usually on the wing in the night. They may 

 be easily distinguished from each other by 

 their horns or feelers : those of the butterfly 

 being clubbed or knobbed at the end ; those 

 of the moth tapering finer and finer to a point. 

 To express it technically the feelers of but- 

 terflies are elevated : those of moths are fili- 

 form. 1 



1 Moths are distinguished from butterflies, among 

 other characters, by having at the base of the under 

 wings, near the anterior edge, a stiff bristle or hair 

 which passes through a hook on the under side of the 

 anterior wings and maintains them when at rest in a 

 horizontal or somewhat inclined position. The most 

 characteristic and distinctive mark of the hawk-moths 

 is to be found in the form of the antennae, which en- 

 crease in diameter from a slender base nearly to the apex, 

 forming a prismatic, fusiform club, and usually termin- 

 ating in a subulated point which is occasionally some- 

 what curved. This thickening of the antennae upwards 

 indicates affinity to the diurnal lepidoptera, but in most 

 of their other properties they are more closely allied to 

 the moths or nocturnal kinds. The wings are narrow 

 and elongated, of a firm consistence, and never borne 

 perpendicularly in repose, but either parallel to the 

 plain of position or slightly deflexed. The suctorial trunk 

 (maxillae) is usually of great length, often equal to that 

 of the whole body ; and appears, at least in some instances, 

 to be of a more simple structure than among butterflies, 

 consisting only of a simple semi-cylindric canal. When, 

 for example, that of the death's-head-moth, which is 

 short and rigid, and so sharply pointed as to be able to 

 pierce the skin of the hand, is cut across, only a single 

 perforation of an oval shape is visible. The palpi em- 

 brace the base of the trunk, consist of three articulations, 

 and are so densely invested with hairs and scales, that 

 their jointed structure is not discernible till these are 

 rubbed off. The eyes are large, globose, and prominent, 

 composed of a great number of facets. The tarsi are 

 all divided into five joints ; the intermediate tibiae are 

 furnished with two spines, and the hinder ones with 

 four ; and in the anterior pair, which are destitute of 

 spines, there is a slender lobe lying along a part of the 

 under side of the tibia, and attached to it by the upper 

 extremity. 



These insects constituted the genus Sphinx of Linnaeus, 

 and they compose the family named Crepuscularia by 



