explanation of them, in those repeated elevations and depressions which have
left their record in mysterious, but still intelligible characters on the face of
organic nature.
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. The body is short, and
terminated in the female by a long curved sword-like ovipositor (not seen in the
cut), and the legs are all long and strongly-spined. These insects are sluggish in
their motions, depending for safety on their resemblance to foliage, their horny
shield and wing-coverts, and their spiny legs.
The large islands to the east of New Guinea are very little known, but the
occurrence of crimson lories, which are quite absent from Australia, and of
cockatoos allied to those of New Guinea and the Moluccas, shows that they
belong to the Papuan group; and we are thus able to define the Malay
Archipelago as extending eastward to the Solomon's Islands. New Caledonia and
the New Hebrides, on the other hand, seem more nearly allied to Australia; and
the rest of the islands of the Pacific, though very poor in all forms of life, possess
a few peculiarities which compel us to class them as a separate group. Although
as a matter of convenience I have always separated the Moluccas as a distinct