FLORAL ANALOGIES. 121 



things that frequent them. This is peculiarly exemplified in 

 the Butterfly, which must be regarded, par excellence, as the 

 Insect of Flowers, and a Flower-like Insect, gay and innocent, 

 made after a floral pattern, and coloured after floral hues. But 

 even with the insect families which are usually dark and repul- 

 sive, that, for instance, of Cockroaches, which are for the most 

 part black or brown, the few species which resort to flowers 

 are gaily coloured. What a contrast also between the dark 

 loathsome in-door Spiders, and their prettily painted, green and 

 red, and white and yellow brethren of the field and garden, 

 which seek their prey among the flowers ; while more striking 

 still, is the difference between the wingless disgusting plague of 

 cities, and the elegantly formed, brightly coloured, winged 

 Bugs, which are common frequenters of the parterre. Whether 

 this be imputed to the effect of light, or assigned poetically to 

 the breathing influence of a flowery atmosphere, and the ten- 

 dency of all things to produce their similitudes, there lies 

 beneath the natural fact a moral analogy of application to 

 ourselves. 



There has been traced by naturalists an intimate analogy of 

 states and developments between the Lepidopterous Insect and 

 the perfect vegetable. The Caterpillar, disclosed from the egg, 

 encases in its various skins the gradually expanding form of the 

 future Butterfly ; as the plant, burst from the seed or bulb, 

 encloses in its successive integuments (of root, stalk, and floral 

 leaves), the flower and fruit in process of formation. The 

 chrysalis, that shroud or cover which at once protects and 

 imprisons the winged creature it encloses, finds its correspond- 

 ence in the defensive calyx which enwraps the delicate corolla. 

 Both burst from their envelopes in perfect form, the Insect to 

 die, the flower to fade, soon after having provided for the con- 

 tinuance of their kind. 



In the habits, no less than in the structure, of the Butterfly 

 and the flower, there is observable no slight degree of corres- 

 pondence. In the gloom of night or of cloudy weather, the 



