386 
SEXUAL SELECTION. 
Part II. 
CHAPTEB XL 
Insects, continued . — Order Lepidoptera. 
Courtship of Butterflies — Battles — Ticking noise — Colours com- 
mon to Both sexes, or more Brilliant in the males — Examples — 
Not due to the direct action of the conditions of life — Colours 
adapted for protection — Colours of moths — Display — Per- 
ceptive powers of the Lepidoptera — Variability — Causes of the 
difference in colour Between the males and females — Mimickry,. 
female Butterflies more Brilliantly coloured than the males — 
Bright colours of caterpillars — Summary and concluding re- 
marks on the secondary sexual characters of insects — Birds and 
insects compared. 
In this great Order the most interesting point for us is 
the difference in colour between the sexes of the same 
species, and between the distinct species of the same 
genus. Nearly the whole of the following chapter will 
be devoted to this subject ; but I will first make a few 
remarks on one or two other points. Several males may 
often be seen pursuing and crowding round the same 
female. Their courtship appears to be a prolonged affair,, 
for I have frequently watched one or more males pirouet- 
ting round a female until I became tired, without seeing 
the end of the courtship. Although butterflies are such 
weak and fragile creatures, they are pugnacious, and an 
Emperor butterfly 1 has been captured with the tips of 
its wings broken from a conflict with another male.. 
Mr. Collingwood in speaking of the frequent battles 
1 Apatura Iris : i The Entomologist’s Weekly Intelligencer/ 1859 r 
p. 139. For the Bornean Butterflies see C. Collingwood, ‘ Hambies of 
a Naturalist/ 1868, p. 183. 
