sphinx-moth

He points out that there is no difficulty in believing in the existence of such a moth as F. Müller had described (_Nature_, 1873, p. 223), a Brazilian sphinx-moth with a trunk 10 to 11 in. in length.

Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1

He points out that there is no difficulty in believing in the existence of such a moth as F. Mueller had described (Nature, 1873, p. 223), a Brazilian sphinx-moth with a trunk 10 to 11 in. in length.

Alfred Russel Wallace Letters and Reminiscences

Here is one which presents a pair of tiny clubs to the sphinx-moth at its threshold, gluing them to its bulging eyes.

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Hence we infer the sphinx-moth to be the insect complement to the blossom, and we may correctly infer, moreover, that the flower is thus a night-bloomer.

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But victory complete and demoralizing to his opponents awaited this oracular utterance when later a disciple of Darwin, led by the same spirit of faith and conviction, visited Madagascar, and was soon able to affirm that he had caught the moth, a huge sphinx-moth, and that its tongue measured eleven inches in length.

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Gray's surmise, 188; sphinx-moth its only complement, 190; manner of carrying the pollen by sphinx-moth, 193; extracting the pollen with a pencil; length of the nectary, 196; purple-fringed, 198; ragged, 200; very exceptional provision, 201; yellow-spiked, 203; moccasin-flower; ladies'-slipper;

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Blossoms whose functions, through long eras of adaptation, have gradually shaped themselves to the forms of certain chosen insect sponsors; blossoms whose chalices are literally fashioned to bees or butterflies; blossoms whose slender, prolonged nectaries invite and reward the murmuring sphinx-moth alone, the floral throat closely embracing his head while it attaches its pollen masses to the bulging eyes, or perchance to the capillary tongue!

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The sphinx-moth again, one of the lesser of the group.

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Angræcum, its long nectary, 219; tongue of a sphinx-moth eleven inches long, 220; nectary thirteen inches long, 223.

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We see the same great law in the construction of the mouths of insect: what can be more different than the immensely long spiral proboscis of a sphinx-moth, the curious folded one of a bee or bug, and the great jaws of a beetle?

On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life