Medium or large-sized butterflies, with the fore wings twice as long as they are broad; the hind wings relatively small and rounded upon the outer margin; without tails. The palpi are produced. The antennÆ, which are nearly as long as the body, are provided at the tip with a gradually tapering club, thicker and stouter than in the IthomiinÆ, and are clothed with scales on the upper surface. The fore legs are very feebly developed in both sexes. The eggs are cylindrical, twice as high as wide, tapering rather abruptly toward the apex, which is truncated; they are ribbed longitudinally, with strongly developed cross-ridges, giving the egg a somewhat pitted appearance. The caterpillar, when emerging from the egg, has the head somewhat larger than the body; each segment is clothed with hairs, which upon the first moult are replaced by branching spines. The caterpillar, when it reaches maturity, is provided with six branching spines on each segment. The chrysalis is very peculiar in shape, and is strongly angulated and covered with curious projections, which cause it to somewhat resemble a shriveled leaf.

These butterflies are extremely numerous in the tropics of the New World, and are there represented by a number of genera which are rich in species. Most of them are very gaily colored, the prevalent tints being black banded with yellow or crimson, sometimes marked with a brilliant blue luster. They are evidently very strongly protected. Belt, in his "Naturalist in Nicaragua," tells us that birds and other animals observed by him invariably refused to eat these butterflies, although they swarm in the forests; and he vainly endeavored to induce a monkey which was very fond of insects to eat them, the creature revealing by his grimaces that they were extremely distasteful to him. Mr. Wallace believes their immunity from attack is owing to a "strong, pungent, semi-aromatic, or medicinal odor, which seems to pervade all the juices of their system."

Genus HELICONIUS, Latreille

The description of the subfamily applies to the genus sufficiently well to obviate the necessity of a more particular description, as there is but a single species in our fauna.

(1) Heliconius charitonius, LinnÆus, Plate VIII, Fig. 5, ? (The Yellow-barred Heliconian; The Zebra).

This insect is a deep black, the fore wings crossed by three bands of yellow: one near the apex; another running from the middle of the costa to the middle of the outer margin; a third running along the lower edge of the cell, and bending at an obtuse angle from the point where the first median nervule branches toward the outer angle, at its outer extremity followed by a small yellow dot. The hind wings are crossed by a somewhat broad band of yellow running from the inner margin near the base toward the outer angle, which it does not reach, and by a submarginal curved band of paler yellow spots, gradually diminishing in size from the inner margin toward the outer angle. There are also a number of small twinned whitish spots on the margin of the hind wing near the anal angle. The body is black, marked with yellow spots and lines; on the under side both wings are touched with crimson at their base, and the hind wings have some pale pinkish markings near the outer angle.

The caterpillar feeds upon the passion-flower. The chrysalis, which is dark brown, has the power when disturbed of emitting a creaking sound as it wriggles about, a property which is reported to be characteristic of all the insects in the genus. This butterfly is found in the hotter portions of the Gulf States, and is rather abundant in Florida, in the region of the Indian River and on the head waters of the St. Johns. It ranges southward all over the lowlands of Mexico, Central America, and the Antilles.