CHAPTER IX. 



Arthropoda (continued). 



Order XVI. LEPIDOPTERA. 



Butterflies and Moths. 



BUTTERFLIES and Moths belong to the Lepidopterous order of insects that 

 is, insects with scales (lepis) on their wings (pteron). The wing of a butterfly 

 seen through a microscope is a most beautiful object, being covered, in regular 

 lines, with minute scales or feathers of various shapes and characteristics. 

 Butterflies are distinguished from moths, at any rate in the British species, 

 by the fact that they have clubbed antennae, whilst moths' antennas come to 

 a point, and are otherwise unmistakably differentiated. To put it in simpler 

 language, the horns or feelers which protrude from a butterfly's head have 

 small knobs at the end, whilst a moth's feelers have not. Another noticeable 

 difference is to be found in observing the insects at rest. A butterfly's wings 

 stand up at right angles to the body, a moth's wings are folded flat across the 

 body. Butterflies are Rhopalocera, moths Heterocera. There are at the most 

 some sixty-eight species of butterflies inhabiting, or known to have inhabited, 

 Great Britain ; of these some, like the Large Copper, are extinct, others are 

 very rare. It may be said that there are some fifty to fifty-five species which 

 may be met with generally, half that number being quite common, the other 

 half needing looking for in the particular localities they are known to inhabit. 



The eggs of butterflies are some of the most beautiful objects in Nature. 

 Every one, I expect, who reads this book will have seen the clusters of eggs 

 laid by the Common Large Garden Butterflies on cabbages or nasturtiums. 

 (The number of eggs laid by the female varies in different species from 50 

 to 3,000.) View these small white specks under your pocket lens, and you 

 find them beautiful miniature pyramids, ribbed and fluted with delicate lines. 

 The eggs of the different species are all of varying shapes: some are round 

 like balls, others oval, others flat ; some are smooth and glossy, others ribbed 

 and covered with delicate network. And they vary in colour white, yellow, 

 green, purple, red, black. Here, however, it must be noted that all the eggs 

 change in colour as the young caterpillar inside develops. These changes 

 are duly noted in the List of Species (pages 224-237). 



When the larva emerges from the egg after a period of from five to thirty- 



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