LYCYENIDzE. 
183 
Family LYC^ENID^. 
Butterflies of small size, and mostly of very beautiful colour, tbe females are 
almost always of a duller colour than the males, browns and blacks usually ; in size they 
include the smallest known butterflies, some species being not more than half an inch 
in expanse of wings ; often the species occur in very great quantities ; one species, 
Liphyra brassolis, Westwood, is as aberrant in size as it is in other characters, being 
over three inches in expanse ; the larvae and eggs of the Lycseniclse are very distinctive 
and denote their reality as a well-defined and separate family of the Bhopalocera. 
Mr. W. Doherty, who gave much time to the study of the eggs of butterflies, has 
described in detail the eggs of this family, and attempted a division of sub-families 
based on their shape and peculiarities; and his paper, published in the Journal of the 
Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1886, p. 110, is worth careful study and is very instructive; 
he divides the family into six sub-families, and his sub-divisions correspond very closely 
with those of Bingham, published in the Fauna of British India, Butt. ii. p. 284 (1907), 
which are very carefully worked out on the wing venation and general construction of 
the different groups. 
The larvae of the Lycaenidae have had much attention paid them; de Niceville, 
Davidson, Bell, Aitken and Bingham in India, and Trimen in Africa have very carefully 
studied the life history of many species ; de Niceville says (p. 7) that some of the larvae 
are furnished with certain organs which are found in no other larvae of Lepidoptera ; this 
organ consists of an oval opening on the dorsal line of the eleventh segment, with lips 
like a mouth ; these lips can at the will of the larvae be somewhat protruded, and a 
drop of sweet liquid exuded. On the twelfth segment are two other organs, one on 
each side, in the sub-dorsal region. In the genus Curetis, Hiibner, which does not 
possess the mouth-like organ on the eleventh segment, these two organs are of very 
great size and are much more developed than in any other species. Each organ 
consists of a tall pillar, from which, when the larva is touched or frightened, is 
instantly protruded a long tentacle furnished at its head with a brush of long parti¬ 
coloured hairs as long as itself; these hairs open out into a rosette, and the tentacle is 
whorled round with immense rapidity, producing a curious effect, probably to frighten 
away their enemies, the worst of which are ichneumon flies; they are not attended by 
ants, not having the organ on the eleventh segment which exudes the sweet liquid ; in 
those forms that have this organ the larvae are so attended, who, in return for the food 
they obtain from the larvae, act as their most efficient guardians; the ants gently 
stroke the larvae with their antennae and feed on the fluid exuded, and they will 
furiously attack anything interfering with these larvae; de Niceville gives a very 
