Papiliones, this departure from the type may be looked for either in
the form of the antennæ, the position of the wings, or the time of
flight. The first is obviously the most tangible should it occur, and
it does occur. In Urania, the antennæ have become setaceous; the club
has entirely disappeared, yet the other peculiarities remain much as
in Papilio. This single deviation may be assumed as pointing out a
relation to Geometra, which the reader will perceive is supposed to
meet the sub-class Papilio at this point. A second peculiarity is to
be found in an insect figured by Godart, a Polyommatus in shape, but
with pertinated antennæ;[36] the genus he has very suitably named
Barbicornis. This deviation, it must be observed, is in favour of the
Bombyces, which we therefore suppose touching the sub-class at this
point. A third deviation, of a very different kind, is observable in
an insect which Latreille has figured in the Règne Animal, and placed
among the Sphinges: he calls it Coronis D'Urvillii. The antennæ in
this genus, as in Castnia, are gradually incrassated, and they may
probably be eventually both considered as Papiliones: of Coronis
D'Urvillii, I cannot entertain a doubt, as the wings are too
expansive, the antennæ too long, the abdomen too short for it ever to
retain its station among the Sphinges; the inferior wings are also
very decidedly caudate, a common formation among Papiliones, but
unknown among Sphinges; but, let this question be eventually decided
_pro_ or _con_, the approach between Hesperiæ and Sphinges is not
likely to be disputed, nor the fact that it takes place somewhere in
the neighbourhood of the genus Castnia.
[36] Latreille seems to think this to have been a deception,
and that the antennæ which Godart found on the insect did
not belong to it. I cannot suppose that the latter author
could have been so grossly deceived.
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