The Insects Of New Guinea Are Less Known Than The Birds, But They
Seem Almost Equally Remarkable For Fine Forms And Brilliant
Colours.
The magnificent green and yellow Ornithopterae are
abundant, and have most probably spread westward from this point
as far as India.
Among the smaller butterflies are several
peculiar genera of Nymphalidae and Lycaenidae, remarkable for
their large size, singular markings, or brilliant coloration. The
largest and most beautiful of the clear-winged moths (Cocytia
d'urvillei) is found here, as well as the large and handsome
green moth (Nyctalemon orontes). The beetles furnish us with many
species of large size, and of the most brilliant metallic lustre,
among which the Tmesisternus mirabilis, a longicorn beetle of a
golden green colour; the excessively brilliant rose-chafers,
Lomaptera wallacei and Anacamptorhina fulgida; one of the
handsomest of the Buprestidae, Calodema wallacei; and several
fine blue weevils of the genus Eupholus, are perhaps the most
conspicuous. Almost all the other orders furnish us with large or
extraordinary forms. The curious horned flies have already been
mentioned; and among the Orthoptera the great shielded
grasshoppers are the most remarkable. The species here figured
(Megalodon ensifer) has the thorax covered by a large triangular
horny shield, two and a half inches long, with serrated edges, a
somewhat wavy, hollow surface, and a faun median line, so as very
closely to resemble a leaf. The glossy wing-coverts (when fully
expanded, more than nine inches across) are of a fine green
colour and so beautifully veined as to imitate closely some of
the large shining tropical leaves.
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