50 
NYMPH ALINiE. 
Professor Poulton informs me of a very curious fact concerning pupae—briefly, that 
the pupal eyes, wings and other organs are not identical in form and structure with the imaginal 
organs contained within them, but are far more ancestral in type ; “ they are remnants of a time 
when the last stage of metamorphosis in the ancestors of Lepidoptera was something very different 
from a butterfly or moth.” This quotation is from “The External Morphology of the 
Lepidopterous Pupa” in the Trans. Linn. Soc. 2nd Ser. Vol. Y. Pt. 5, a paper which will be found 
most suggestive to many who find more interesting and valuable work in Entomology than mere 
collecting and naming. It thus appears that some of the strange pupal appendages we see are 
practically of no special use nowadays: * archaic relics of a time when they were essential parts of 
the insect; a time perhaps dating long before the Tertiary period, for it appears that many genera 
of butterflies were already well differentiated in Tertiary ages, and have come down to our own 
times practically unchanged in their characteristics, whilst it seems probable that family types may 
have originated in Secondary times, and some perhaps even in Palaeozoic ages. Very few fossil 
butterflies have been found, but Wallace, writing on the “Antiquity of the Genera of Insects ” 
states that two butterflies were found in an Upper Cretaceous formation—a deposit of later 
Secondary date—both recognised as Satyridce and one of them belonging to an existing genus; 
whilst in an older Secondary formation, the Lower Oolite, a wing of a butterfly has been discovered 
allied to the S. American Fam. Brassolidce. But the great generic antiquity of butterflies is 
proved by the evidence of the two former fossils. 
Athyma perius, Linn . 
A common and very conspicuous insect, the most abundant here of the genus. It is 
practically ubiquitous, but prefers open ground, gardens and waste land scattered over with bushes. 
Like all the Athymce it flies swiftly, but usually rests on foliage rather low down. The 
articulations of the abdomen, boldly marked in white, distinguish this butterfly at some distance. 
It is fonder of flowers than the preceding insect. The sexes are alike, and the butterfly is to be 
seen all the year round. 
Fig. 1, PI. VI is from a $ taken in June. 
Egg, hemispherical or bee-hive shape, granulated all over, yellow, and with short white 
bristly hairs. Laid singly on the underside of leaves of the foodplants, Glochidion macrophyllum 
and G. eriocarpum , but chiefly on the former, which has a smooth, shining, coriaceous leaf; the 
latter a crinkled, softly hairy leaf; both plants Nat. Ord. Euphorbiacece; j* 
* Except, perhaps, to deceive the sharp eyes of birds and other pnpae-destroyers, by aiding the resemblance of 
the pupa to a shrivelled leaf or piece of bark; probably the cause of their still being retained, as such “ protected ” 
pupae would tend to escape their foes. 
t Larva also feeds Wendlandia paniculata . See under Limenitis. 
