Zoological Illustrations Series II/Plate 131



If the imagination was taxed to invent, or to concentrate into one figure all that was splendid, lovely, or rare in the insect world, Nature would far exceed the poor invention of man by the production of this incomparably splendid creature; its rarity also is so great, that but one specimen has ever been seen: this was brought from China, and in 1773, belonged to a Captain May, of Hammersmith: with whom it was seen by Drury, and drawn by Harris. It is not however, on this account only that we have been induced to copy this figure, but because its illustration will clear up one of the most intricate and perplexing questions, that has hitherto impeded the natural arrangement of the Linnæn Papiliones, and even of the whole order of Lepidoptera.

The error of Cramer, regarding Rhipheus has already been rectified. It will now be demonstrated that not only are the two insects distinct as species, but that they actually belong to different genera. Cramer's being a Urania of Fabricius and Latrielle, while Drury's is a Papilio of the same authors. This is proved by the figures; and confirmed by the following words of Drury, "The antennæ are black, and knobbed at their extremities," in other words, clavate; while the palpi, as expressed in the figure, are so small as not to project beyond the head, where they lie hid in the frontal hairs: this also being a typical distinction of the Latrellian Papiliones. The figures in Drury's work were all drawn and engraved by Moses Harris, well known as one of the most accurate artists that ever lived: as a remarkable proof of this, we find that he has not failed to delineate that peculiar nuration of the anterior wings, which belongs only to the types of Leilus. A closer affinity therefore between Papilio and Leilus cannot possibly be imagined: while its remarkably hairy front, points out its analogy, as an aberrant type in its own genus, to Chlorisses, among insects, and Dasycephala among birds. So true it is that the natural system "illuminates with a flood of light" every supposed anomaly, and reconciles facts apparently the most inexplicable.