BUTTERFLY. 
347 
of a flower, and robs the nectary of its sweets ; 
seated on the edge of the corolla the little animal 
uncurls its trunk, and directed by an unerring in- 
stinct to the part where the honey lies, imme- 
diately plunges in its proboscis, and extracts the 
contents. 
The icings of butterflies, which constitute the 
beauty of these insects, owe their opacity to the 
variegated dust with which they are covered. This 
dust, which is rubbed off with the slightest touch 
from the surface of the wing, and disregarded as 
a mere powder, is nevertheless highly deserving of 
our notice. Each particle bears some resemblance 
to the feather of a bird, or rather to a fan, being a 
flat substance which widens from the point, and is 
terminated by four or five notches. These scales 
are arranged in a very beautiful and regular man- 
• 
ner on the wings of the insect, one rank being 
partly covered by the other above it, in the same 
way as tiles are laid upon a house. By the help 
of a compound microscope and a deep magnifier, 
these apparent grains of powder are at once con- 
verted into the little scales already mentioned. The 
wing itself is composed of very thick nerves distri- 
buted on a fine transparent film, in which may be 
seen the sockets contrived to receive the taper end 
of the scales. 
The body , which may be divided into the corslet 
and the abdomen, is frequently so covered with 
hair that the rings on the latter part of it are not 
