38 



RIO DE JANEIRO. May — June, 1832. 



fewer numbers than in our own temperate regions. I was 

 much surprised at the habits of Papilio feronia. This butter- 

 fly is not uncommon, and generally frequents the orange- 

 groves. Although a high flier, yet it very frequently alights 

 on the trunks of trees. On these occasions its head is in- 

 variably placed downwards ; and its wings are expanded in a 

 horizontal plane, instead of being folded vertically, as is com- 

 monly the case. This is the only butterfly which I have ever 

 seen that uses its legs for running. Not being aware of this 

 fact, the insect, more than once, as I cautiously approached 

 with my forceps, shuffled on one side just as the instru- 

 ment was on the point of closing, and thus escaped. But a 

 far more singular fact, is the power which this species pos- 

 sesses of making a noise.* Several times when a pair, pro- 

 bably male and female, were chasing each other in an ir- 

 regular course, they passed within a few yards of me ; and I 

 distinctly heard a clicking noise, similar to that produced by 

 a toothed wheel passing under a spring catch.f The noise 

 was continued at short intervals, and could be distinguished 

 at about twenty yards distance. I cannot form a conjecture 

 how it is produced ; but I am certain there is no error in the 

 observation. 



I was disappointed in the general aspect of the Coleoptera. 

 The number of minute and obscurely-coloured beetles is ex- 

 ceedingly great.* The cabinets of Europe can, as yet, boast 



* I find in Langsdorff 's travels (in the years 1803-7, p. 74), it is 

 said, that in the island of St. Catherine's, on the coast of Brazil, a butter- 

 fly called Februa HofFmanseggi, makes a noise, when flying away, like a 

 rattle. 



f Mr. Waterhouse has had the kindness to examine this butterfly, 

 but cannot discover any mechanism by which the noise is pro- 

 duced. 



* I may mention, as a common instance of one day's (June 2.3d) col- 

 lecting, when I was not attending particularly to the Coleoptera, that I 

 caught sixty-eight species of that order. Among these, there were only 

 two of the Carabids, four Brachelytra, fifteen Rhyncophora, and fourteen 

 of the Chrysomelidse. Thirty-seven species of Arachnidse, which I brought 

 home, will be sufficient to prove that I was not paying overmuch atten- 

 tion to the generally favoured order of Coleoptera. 



