146 THE INSECT WORLD. 
which all the Leotards of the present day, and those who are to. 
succeed them, can never accomplish. With such a persistency, 
this caterpillar can sustain its body in the air for a considerable 
time, in all the positions imaginable, between the vertical and the 
horizontal, and downwards again in any incline from the horizontal 
to the vertical. “If one considers,” says Réaumur, “ how far we 
are from having in the muscles of our arms a force capable of sup- 
porting us in such attitudes as these, we must own that the power 
of the muscles in these insects is prodigious.” 
We will not dwell now on the variableness of the length of the 
body of caterpillars; on the fleshy appendages which are to be 
observed on them; on the hairs which ‘either beautify or render 
them hideous, according to the fancy of the observer; nor on the 
various colours with which they are decorated. We will speak 
again on. these various characteristics, when giving the history 
of some species of Lepidoptera remarkable in different ways. 
Many caterpillars are solitary ; others live in companies more or 
less numerous, either when young, or during the whole of their 
existence. 
With the exception of a great number of moths, which live at the 
expense of our furs, or woollen stuffs, and leather or fatty matters, 
all caterpillars feed on plants. From the root to the seeds, no part 
of the vegetable is safe from their attacks. The greatest number 
of the species, however, prefer the leaves. Those of the most acrid 
and poisonous are no more spared than those of the most harmless 
plants. There are caterpillars which eat the leaves of the Euphorbia, 
or spurge, for instance. 
“T wished to try,” says Réaumur, “the milk of this plant on 
my tongue. It produced hardly any effect upon it at first; but - 
after a quarter of an hour I found my mouth on fire, and it was a 
heat which reiterated garglings with water during many hours 
in succession could not quench. This continued till the next day. 
The heat passed successively from one part of my mouth to another. 
J, however, saw many of my caterpillars drinking greedily the 
great drops of milk which were at the end of the broken stem I 
had presented to them.”’ 
Ts it not extraordinary that there are caterpillars which live on 
the nettle P—-that they eat the leaves of this plant, armed as it is 
