In
These Rocky Forests Dwell Some Of The Finest Butterflies In The
World.
Three species of Ornithoptera, measuring seven or eight
inches across the wings, and beautifully marked with spots or
masses of satiny yellow on a black ground, wheel through the
thickets with a strong sailing flight.
About the damp places are
swarms of the beautiful blue-banded Papilios, miletus and
telephus, the superb golden green P. macedon, and the rare little
swallow-tail Papilio rhesus, of all of which, though very active,
I succeeded in capturing fine series of specimens.
I have rarely enjoyed myself more than during my residence here.
As I sat taking my coffee at six in the morning, rare birds would
often be seen on some tree close by, when I would hastily sally
out in my slippers, and perhaps secure a prize I had been
seeking after for weeks. The great hornbills of Celebes (Buceros
cassidix) would often come with loud-flapping wings, and perch
upon a lofty tree just in front of me; and the black baboon-
monkeys, Cynopithecus nigrescens, often stared down in
astonishment at such an intrusion into their domains while at
night herds of wild pigs roamed about the house, devouring
refuse, and obliging us to put away everything eatable or
breakable from our little cooking-house. A few minutes' search on
the fallen trees around my house at sunrise and sunset, would
often produce me more beetles than I would meet with in a day's
collecting, and odd moments could be made valuable which when
living in villages or at a distance from the forest are
inevitably wasted.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 321 of 419
Words from 87432 to 87701
of 114260
