THE CHRYSALIS. 9 



the marauder recommences operations, another sweep is 

 taken out, then another, and soon the leaf is left a mere 

 skeleton. 



But a change, far moro important than mere skin- 

 shifting, follows close upon the animal's caterpillar- 

 maturity, complete as soon as it ceases to grow. 



The form and habits of a worm are to be exchanged 

 for the glories and pleasures of winged life ; but this 

 can only be done at the price of passing through an 

 intermediate state ; one neither of eating, nor of flying, 

 but motionless, helpless and death-like. 



This is called the CHRYSALIS or PUPA state. 



Pupa is a Latin word, signifying a creature swathed, 

 or tied up ; and is applied to this stage of all insects, 

 because all, or some, of their parts are then bound up, 

 as if swathed. 



The term Chrysalis is applicable to butterflies only, 

 and, strictly, only to a few of these Chrysalis 1 being 

 derived from the Greek ^pvcrog (chrysos), gold in 

 allusion to the splendid gilding of the surface in certain 

 species, such as the Vanessas, Fritillaries, and some 

 others. 



In the older works on entomology we frequently meet 

 with the term Aurelia applied to this state, and having 

 the same meaning as chrysalis, but derived from the 

 Latin word Aurum, gold. 



Here the reader is again referred to Plate I. for a 

 series of the principal forms assumed by the chrysalides 

 of our native butterflies, and as these for the most part 

 represent the next stage of the caterpillars previously 

 figured, an opportunity is afforded of tracing the insect's 

 form through its three great changes; the whole of the 

 butterflies in their perfect state being given in their 

 proper places in the body of the work. 



The complicated and curious processes by which 

 various caterpillars assume the chrysalis form, and 

 suspend themselves securely in their proper attitudes, 



1 Plural Chrysalides. 



