air, and seize the bird upon the wing: all these creatures have been observed to fall its prey. The serpent has neither hands nor talons, yet it can outwrestle the athlete, and crush the tiger in the embrace of its ponderous overlapping folds. Instead of licking up its food as it glides along, the serpent uplifts its crushed prey, and presents it, grasped in the deathcoil as in a hand, to its slimy, gaping mouth. It is truly wonderful to see the work of hands, feet, and fins, performed by a modification of the vertebral column."

A curious inquiry for the naturalist and physiologist relates to the probable sensations which animals differing widely from man receive from their organs. In the fish world we have abundant specimens of highly-developed eyes; but in the lowest fishes, the lancelet and the myxine, the eye is as simple as in the leech-" a minute tegumentary follicle is coated by dark pigment, which receives the end of a special cerebral nerve." A vague sense of light, without the slightest recognition of form or colour, is probably all that this humble instrument can enable its possessor to arrive at, still the function is that of which we should call sight; but how is John Hunter's question, "Is the mode of smelling in fishes similar to that of tasting in other animals ?" to be answered? The fluid element in which the fish dwell carries over their so-called smelling apparatus whatever substances the water has in suspension or solution, and how does it affect the fishes' sensorium? Do they smell in the sense in which we smell? or do they taste with their noses? or do they do both in some mixed fashion?

The hearing of fishes probably ranges from a low perception of sound to a discrimination of tones, in those fishes (the gurnards, for example), which, by a peculiar mechanism in their air-bladders, are able to utter a certain range of musical notes. Amongst these creatures, are bad performers hissed, and good ones applauded and encored? In most fishes, in addition to a complex hearing apparatus, "otolites," or earstones-that is, small masses of carbonate of lime-float in a fluid cavity, and by their motions assist the auditory process, probably by reinforcing sound. A small transparent slug shows these otolites-which do not exclusively belong to fish-very well. He should be gently squeezed in a compressorium, or live-box, and examined with an inch or two-thirds. The auditory cavity, with these little bodies in active motion, will soon be discovered.

The teeth of the cold-blooded vertebrata are elaborately illustrated by Prof. Owen, and a great many of them in section afford splendid microscopic objects. One class of extinct fishes, the Dendrodont, or " tree-toothed," are remarkable for

the beautiful convolutions of structure which their sections present. The fish world exhibit teeth of a variety of shapes, the conical being the predominant. "As to number, they range from zero to countless quantities." Sometimes their teeth are slender, sharp-pointed, and so numerous and closely aggregated, "as to resemble the plush or pile of velvet" all the teeth of the perch are of this kind; they are called "villiform." When equally fine and numerous, but longer, they are named "ciliiform ;" and rather stronger, are "setiform," bristle-like. The pike presents specimens of rasping teeth; and in the pharyngeal bones of the wrasse -a common aquarium fish hemispherical teeth are so numerous, and spread over so broad a surface, as to resemble a pavement." All these matters may be easily verified by our readers; and microscopic preparations of fish-teeth, of various sorts, would form a very interesting collection.

THE HUMMING-BIRD HAWK-MOTH.

BY THE HON. MRS. WARD.

(With a Coloured Plate.)

THE entomologist who may chance to look at the garden scene in our plate, and to read the article which it illustrates, will probably find nothing new-nothing that memory and imagination would not supply, were the following words only to be said, "Macroglossa stellatarum, abundant in 1865." The charming moth to which that name belongs would at once present itself to the mind's eye and ear, with its rapid flight, its graceful poising on wing, its brilliant eyes and long proboscis, its singular black and white plumes and velvety birdlike tail, and the loud peculiar humming noise of its wings. Its classified position among the insect tribes would be present to the recollection, and its long composite name would be too familiar to arouse criticism.

But the case of the reader who is not an entomologist is different. Such a reader may perhaps have pursued other branches of knowledge with great diligence, and may feel perfectly at home in any discussion arising about them, yet till this year may have attached no idea to the word moth, than that it appertains to the tiny devastator of our raiment, and to a few larger dingy creatures that point a moral by coming at the evening hour to imperil their lives around our candles. How startling to an intelligent observer of this kind was the

sudden discovery last summer that a beautiful creature exists, resembling a very small humming-bird, and seeming to hold a place above most insects in power of flight, and in symptoms of intelligence. What can it be? was the question asked, perhaps by hundreds of observers, in various parts of the British isles. The numerous newspaper paragraphs which appeared on the subject after a while supplied the name, "Humming-bird Hawk-moth." "Oh, that must be our friend," was the comment immediately made. Possibly, further information was desired; and as it may not have been obtained by observers not happening to be possessed of entomological books, I will briefly state here a few particulars about the moth's name and its place in the insect world, before proceeding to record the fact of its unusually frequent occurrence in 1865.

It is the "Sphinx stellatarum" of Linnæus and other writers, but now called Macroglossa stellatarum, its English appellation being "Humming-bird Hawk-moth." The name, Hawk-moth, belongs not only to this insect, but to several other genera; for instance, there is the Death's-head Hawkmoth, the Elephant Hawk-moth, etc. They are distinguished by the strength and peculiarity of their hawk-like flight, and often by their large size. Most of the hawk-moths have long bodies and comparatively small wings; the hinder pair, especially, being small in proportion to the size of the insect. The caterpillars of some of these moths are of remarkable aspect, especially that of the Privet Hawk-moth. This caterpillar can assume an attitude which reminded Linnæus of the figures of that fabulous creature, the sphinx, and hence he bestowed the name "sphinx" on the hawk-moths. The caterpillar of the Humming-bird Hawk-moth is not very remarkable in appearance; its colours are green, white, yellow, and a dusky hue, arranged in stripes ;* it feeds on different kinds of galium and rubia, and the galiums being stellate plants, suggested the name "stellatarum." The name, Humming-bird, speaks for itself. More than once it has actually been mistaken for a small humming-bird by persons who had seen the latter in America, so curiously similar are the gestures of the bird and the insect.

"Macroglossa," the generic name of the moth, of course denotes the long tongue or proboscis which it possesses. This length of proboscis is observable also in some of the other hawk-moths; and Mr. Westwood notices the interesting connexion which exists between the variation in the length of the spiral tongue and the rapidity of flight possessed by these

A figure of the caterpillar, resting on a stem of Galium aparine, or goosegrass, will be observed in the plate.

insects, depending as it does on their habit "of extracting the nectareous juices of tube-bearing flowers by means of their elongated proboscis."* The description given by Kirby and Spence of the proboscis with which moths and butterflies are supplied, applies so well to that of the insect at present under consideration, that I will repeat it :

"The innumerable tribes of moths and butterflies eat nothing but the honey secreted in the nectaries of flowers, which are frequently situated at the bottom of a tube of great length. They are accordingly provided with an organ exquisitely fitted for its office-a slender tubular tongue, more or less long, sometimes not shorter than three inches, but spirally convoluted when at rest, like the mainspring of a watch, into a convenient compass. This tongue, which they have the power of instantly unrolling, they dart into the bottom of a flower, and as through a siphon, draw up a supply of the delicious nectar on which they feed. A letter would scarcely suffice for describing fully the admirable structure of this organ. I must content myself, therefore, with here briefly observing that it is of a cartilaginous substance, and apparently composed of a series of innumerable rings, which, to be capable of such rapid convolution, must be moved by an equal number of distinct muscles; and that, though seemingly simple, it is in fact composed of three distinct tubes-the two lateral ones cylindrical and entire, intended, as Reaumur thinks, for the reception of air; and the intermediate one, through which alone the honey is conveyed, nearly square, and formed of two separate grooves projecting from the lateral tubes; which grooves, by means of a most curious apparatus of hooks like those in the laminæ of a feather, inosculate into each other, and can be either united into an air-tight canal, or be instantly separated, at the pleasure of the insect."+

It is curious to observe the great variety which exists in the size of this organ, when we compare various moths. I collected the moths of the King's County several years ago, to the number of about a hundred and twenty distinct kinds; and a slight examination of this collection (still in pretty good order) enables me to verify this remark. The fact is, that some moths and butterflies take no food in the perfect state, and the mouth organs are therefore small and rudimentary. Corresponding variations (says Westwood) of course occur in the development of the digestive organs, and he notices that in some of the hawk-moths, " in which the spiral apparatus attains its greatest length, nearly equalling that of the entire body, the stomach is scarcely smaller than it is in the pupa

* British Moths and their Transformations, p. 5.

+ Introduction to Entomology. Seventh edition (1857), p. 222.

state; whereas in the Dendrolimus pini, in which the parts of the mouth are atrophied, with the exception of the labial palpi, the stomach is almost obsolete."*

I have given prominence to my description of Macroglossa's proboscis, because (as will presently be seen) my correspondents have paid especial attention to this singular organ, and been struck by the beauty of its form and movements.

I need not enter into any formal description of the moth, as I have depicted it with great care in my plate from real specimens, one caught by me in 1845, at Ballylin, King's County, and two of the others secured at different places during last summer. The specimen represented lowest in the plate, shows the under side of the insect; and the attitude of the resting moth at the right was taken not merely from a preserved specimen, but from life. The moth threw back its antennæ, remained perfectly still, and allowed me to gain a good idea of its profile, which was strangely like that of a hare or rabbit, when this position was assumed.

The upper figure, also represented partly in profile, gives a good idea of the moth's head, and illustrates the description of the insect which, as may be remembered, was given among the "Notes and Memoranda" of the INTELLECTUAL OBSERVER for last September, in a paragraph by Mr. C. S. Beckett. This description is so happy, that I may be excused if I repeat a few words of it. One even visited my bouquet, and most unceremoniously rifled the sweets of one flower after another, as I held them in my hand, thus giving me an opportunity of closely observing its manoeuvres, the vigilance of its hawk-like eyes, the accuracy with which it inserts its long flexible proboscis into each flower, and its mouse-like head and body. Another day I watched it unerringly dip its needle-tongue into the base of each petal of a carnation."

My plate also illustrates some of the remarks made in the numerous accounts of the moth which I have received from friends in various counties. I shall presently quote a few of these, as they give the impressions of the beholders with much freshness and spirit.

The account I have generally received in answer to inquiries is, that my correspondents had never seen it before, but had repeatedly observed it last summer, indeed from the beginning of June to the 16th of November, these being the earliest and latest dates which I have received. The abundance of Macroglossa has been notified to me by entomologists,

* Introduction to the Modern Classification of Insects, p. 313.

I have never happened to meet the caterpillar, and have therefore copied it from the work of Humphreys and Westwood, British Moths and their Transformations.