Page:Jardine Naturalist's Library Foreign Butterflies.djvu/158

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134
HELICONIA.

depressed, with a series of long fleshy lobes on each side; that of H. Calliope short and cylindrical, clothed with slender spines and tufts of hair: these species form the genus Nerias, although they are too dissimilar to be associated with propriety. Others are smooth (H. Psidii), and some are covered with very long white hairs (H. Ricini). In these circumstances, it is not likely that a natural arrangement of this pretty group will be effected until we become better acquainted with the caterpillars, very few of which have hitherto been examined. Chrysalis invariably suspended by the tail only.

These insects, as has been already mentioned, are confined to America and the West India Islands, the larva subsisting on the different kinds of Passifloræ, a beautiful tribe of plants well known to be likewise peculiar to the new world. They seem to be represented in India, as Dr. Horsfield remarks, by the genera Euplœa and Idea.