Part 19

The generic characters are more determinate than is the case with many others of this order. The antennæ are slender, linear throughout their whole length, or thickening so insensibly towards the extremity as to deviate but slightly from that shape. The palpi are placed close together, ascending, and clothed with scales, the terminal portion narrow and very much compressed: abdominal margin of the inferior wings curved downwards, and forming a deep groove for receiving the body. Discoidal cell of the posterior wings open behind; claws bifid. The caterpillars vary in form, as well as the chrysalides, and may probably, if more fully known, enable us to subdivide this family into more natural groups.

MORPHO HELENOR.

PLATE XXI.

Godart.--Pap. Helenor, Cramer, Pl. 86, fig. A, B; Herbst. Pap. Pl. 26, fig. 1, 2; Esper. Papillon’s Exotiques, Pl. 42, fig. 2.

This affords an example of that section of the genus in which the upper wings are more or less concave on the outer margin, and the inferior pair without any prolongation behind. They are almost exclusively South American. M. Helenor expands from four to five inches; surface black, with a broad band of silvery blue or violet blue, extending from the middle of the anterior margin to the anal extremity; sometimes rather narrow and well defined on the inner edge, at other times enlarged to within a short distance of the base of the wings; at the anterior extremity of this band, on the costa, there is an oblique white patch, and beyond it, on the upper wings, a single row of small white spots in the male, and two in the female. The secondary wings have an indistinct row of red crescents near the hinder margin, and the sinuosities in all the wings are white. The colour beneath is dark brown, the upper wings with three large ocelli having a white pupil surrounded with ferruginous and violet, the iris yellow, enclosed in a green circle which has a crescent of the same colour on the inner side; under wings with four similar ocelli, three of them contiguous, the interior one insulated. Towards the base of both wings are several transverse flexuose green stripes, and along the outer edge three greyish lines, more or less interrupted with red, especially in the hinder wings. The body is black above and brown beneath.

PLATE 21.

Morpho Helenar

From S. America.

Lizars sc.]

In the variety figured there are a few yellow streaks on the under side of the anterior wings, and a red stripe at the base of each wing; at the same time the three posterior ocelli are prolonged into a point, and a spurious ocellus is observable adjoining the anterior one.

Found not unfrequently in many countries of South America.

MORPHO ADONIS.

PLATE XXII. Fig. 1.

Godart.--Pap. Adonis, Cramer, Pl. 61. fig. A, B; Herbst. Pap. Pl. 26, fig. 3, 4; Esper. Pap. Exotiques, Pl. 55, fig. 2.

As a specimen of that division of Morpho which has the upper wings scarcely or not at all concave on their outer edge, and the anal angle of the under pair prolonged into an obtuse rudimentary tail, we have represented a species of great beauty although inferior in size to many of its congeners, the expansion of the wings seldom exceeding three inches and a half. The surface of the male, when seen in certain directions, is of the most brilliant azure-blue, the whole of the exterior margin of the primary wings surrounded with black, and near the apex are two small white spots, the anterior one longitudinal, the other orbicular. In the female the blue colour has not such a high degree of lustre; the posterior margin is widely black, and bears two rows of white spots in the upper wings and one row in the under. On the under side the colour is greyish-brown, with several common oblique bands of a paler hue, and three or four oblong ocelli with a white pupil and a black iris surrounded by a yellow ring; the anal angle marked with short undulating black lines. Body brownish-black above, concolorous with the same face of the wings beneath.

PLATE 22.

1. Morpha Adonis. 2. Pavonia Teucer Brazil.]

Found in various parts of South America, but apparently most plentiful in Brazil and Guiana.

GENUS PAVONIA.

The group composing this genus was separated from the preceding by Godart, chiefly on account of the discoidal cell in the secondary wings being closed. Besides this character the palpi are not so densely clothed with scales, and the inferior nervure of the upper wings is curved near its origin in the form of the letter S. The species very closely resemble the Morphos in most other respects, but their colours are generally less brilliant. They are all from South America, and in that country they are far most abundant in Brazil. The caterpillars of several different kinds have been represented by Madam Merian, and, like those of Morpho, they differ from each other in their appearance and properties.

PAVONIA TEUCER.

PLATE XXII. Fig. 2.

Pap. Teucer, Linn.--Merian, Surinam Ins. Pl. 23; Cramer, Pl. 51, fig. A, B.

Extent of the wings from five to six inches; the surface of the primary pair of a livid hue at the base and dark brown at the extremity, the latter colour traversed by a yellow flexuose line near the middle of the secondary wings, slate-blue anteriorly, and black behind. On the under side the wings are very richly mottled, the ground colour being light brown, variegated with numerous undulating black lines, the anterior pair with five very irregular yellowish-white transverse bands, and four ocellated spots near the apex, the hinder one larger than the others, surrounded by a yellow ring and having a white point within, not in the centre, but inclining to the inner side: the secondary pair with three broad indistinct whitish bands, and near the middle three ocelli, the intermediate one minute, the hinder very large and surmounted by a black arch. The body is dark brown above.

This insect inhabits an extensive tract of the warmer parts of South America.

ARPIDEA CHORINÆA.

PLATE XXIII.

Pap. Chorinæus, Fabr.--Pap. Arcesilaus, Cramer, Pl. 294, fig. A, B (male), fig. C, D (fem.); Stoll’s Supp. Pl. 6, fig. 1 (caterpillar), fig. 1, A (chrysalis)--Satyrus Chorinæus, Godart.