Page:Jardine Naturalist's Library Foreign Butterflies.djvu/99

93 PAPILIO.

from the Ornithoptera, which may be esteemed the chiefs and princes of their race, we now come to the Papilios, properly so called, some of which are scarcely inferior in their dimensions and imposing aspect. Such, at least, is the case with P. Antimachus and P. Antenor, which besides their large size, partake of some of the other characters of the group just referred to, and thus form the passage from it to Papilio. But the great majority are of very inferior size, and many of them so dissimilar in aspect that they might be thought to afford sufficient distinctions for arranging them in numerous different genera. On a close examination, however, the species are found to be so intimately allied in all essential parts of structure, that the most judicious systematists have not attempted to separate them. Such authors as have followed an opposite course, Hubner for example, have proved by no means successful in establishing subdivisions; and the only effect of such a proceeding is to encumber the subject with a number of generic names without eliciting a more philosophical arrangement, or one better adapted to aid the student. As at present constituted, the genus is compact and