Mr.
H.O. Forbes has described a most interesting example of this kind of
simulation in Java. While pursuing a large butterfly through the jungle,
he was stopped by a dense bush, on a leaf of which he observed one of
the skipper butterflies sitting on a bird's dropping. "I had often," he
says, "observed small Blues at rest on similar spots on the ground, and
have wondered what such a refined and beautiful family as the Lycaenidae
could find to enjoy, in food apparently so incongruous for a butterfly.
I approached with gentle steps, but ready net, to see if possible how
the present species was engaged. It permitted me to get quite close, and
even to seize it between my fingers; to my surprise, however, part of
the body remained behind, adhering as I thought to the excreta. I looked
closely, and finally touched with my finger the excreta to find if it
were glutinous. To my delighted astonishment I found that my eyes had
been most perfectly deceived, and that what seemed to be the excreta was
a most artfully coloured spider, lying on its back with its feet crossed
over and closely adpressed to the body.
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