242 



AN ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY. 



club is abrupt at the tip and not drawn out into a hook or 

 recurved. In the skippers, or Hesperids, the head is broad, the 

 eyes are comparatively small, the feelers are widely separated, 

 set close to the eyes, and terminated by a pointed tip which is 

 often recurved or hooked. 



A large series of the true butterflies is distinguished by having 

 the anterior pair of feet more or less aborted or imperfect, and 

 these, the ' ' brush-footed ' ' butterflies, are classed in two famiHes, 



Fig. 251. 



the NymphalidcB, containing moderate-sized or large species, and 

 the LyccBiiidce, containing small species, in which the colors are 

 blue or coppery, or have the under sides marked with fine, 

 thread-like lines. They are the "blues," "coppers," and 

 " hair-streaks." 



Among our most common species of the first family is the 

 "milk-weed butterfly," Danais archippus, quite a large red- 

 brown insect, with the wing-veins broadly black marked. It 

 becomes abundant in late summer and fall, and its caterpillar, 

 green in color, marked with black lines, and furnished with rather 

 long, black, hair-like tentacles, may be often seen feeding upon 

 milk-weeds. This species will serve to typify the family to w^hich 

 it belongs, and is easily raised by any one curious to watch its 

 transformations. If the caterpillar be confined with a sufficient 

 supply of fresh leaves, it will grow to about an inch and a half in 

 length, wall then fasten itself by means of its hind feet to a little 

 pad of silk, and will change to a chunky, bright-green chrysalis, 

 or pupa, marked with small golden spots, one of the prettiest 

 objects that can be imagined. In a few days the color will be- 



a, head of Papilio, show- 

 ing where antennae are in- 

 serted ; b, same of an 

 Hesperid. 



a, foreleg of a brush-footed butterfly entirely 

 aborted ; b, oi Lyccsna, male, tarsus one-jointed. 



