in 





BUTTERFLIES AND MOTHS 145 



Warning colours are particularly noticeable in many cater- 

 pillars, and the more conspicuous and gaudy the appearance of 

 the insect, the more distasteful it is generally found to be. 

 Although so plump, the handsome larva of the Privet Hawk- 

 Moth, with its bright bars of colour, is left severely alone by the 

 insect-eating birds, who also will not touch the larva of the 

 Magpie or Gooseberry Moth, with its striking black and orange 

 markings. 



A very large number of our British moths which sleep or remain 

 dormant during the daytime have the markings and coloration 

 of their wings so similar to the general tone of their favourite 

 resting-place as to render them practically invisible at a few yards* 

 distance. The Lappet Moth, the Buff-tip Moth, the Old Lady 

 Moth, and the Pine Hawk-Moth may be mentioned as common 

 and familiar examples from a very long list of protectively coloured 

 British moths. 



A most remarkable example of protective mimicry is that of 

 the Indian Leaf Butterfly (Kallima inachis), which, when at rest 

 with folded wings, has an extraordinary resemblance to a dead 

 leaf. It is a large and handsome insect, the upper surface of the 

 wings being a fine bluish or purplish colour, with a transparent 

 spot in the middle of the fore-wings, beyond which a broad orange 

 band in some species, or a bluish-white one in others, runs obliquely 

 from the front edge of the fore- wings nearly to the hinder angle. 

 The fore-v/ings are more or less pointed, and the anal angle of 

 the hind-wings is produced into a short, blunt tail. The under 

 surface is brown, with a dark streak resembling a midrib running 

 from the tip of the fore-wings to the tail of the hind-wings. The 

 surface is irregularly streaked and mottled, and Mr. A. R. Wallace 

 describes the Sumatran species as being invisible when at rest, 

 from its resemblance to the dead leaves among which it always 

 settles. The butterfly sits with its wings over its back, and its 

 head and antennae raised and hidden between them, while the 

 tails of the hind-wings rest upon the branch, corresponding exactly 



appearance with the stalk of the leaf. 



To the family Nymphalidse belong quite half the known butter- 

 flies, including the Danaidce already mentioned, and the glorious 

 metallic blue genus Morpho of South America. The second sub- 

 family of the Nymphalida, the Satyridce, contains at least a 



K 



