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 Noctuce, 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 Geometrce and 

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

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

 same ; the butterfly 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 Phalcence, through the subdivision 

 Zygcena ! 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 Mg&ria 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 



