124 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXVI. 



here are known and are given below. There are 6 or 7 species known 

 from the Indian region. The foodplant of the larvae is always Zizyphus 

 of the family Rhamnacece ; various species such as cBnoplia, ruyosa, jujuba ; 

 each species' of butterfly seeming to art'ect one particular species. 



158. Castalius decidea, Hewitson. — Male. Upperside : dark brownish- 

 black with a broad, median, oblique, white band across fore and hind 

 wings, sometimes extended on the fore wing beyond vein 5 and produced 

 outwards between veins 4 and 5 into a hook-like form, the top of this band 

 looking rather like the head of a walrus. Fore wing : no appressed hairs 

 on the disc and very little hair-fringe to the inner margin ; cilia chequered 

 black and white. Hind wing : sometimes with a series of white, marginal 

 lunules included in the black colour in interspaces lb, 1 and 2 where there 

 is, then, also a black anteciliary line ; cj'/j'a as in fore wing. Underside: 

 white or yellowish with the following black markings: — extreme base black 

 produced outwards along vein 12 in a small club-shaped mark into base 

 of cell and connected in interspace la by a broad, brown bar with a broad, 

 curved band running through the top of the cell to the costa before the 

 middle, generally narrowest below ; a broad, short band from costa after 

 the middle, obliquely outwards down to and below vein 6 ; another 

 short band, generally limited by vein 1 below up to vein 8 (sometimes 

 beyond), postmedial ; a more or less quadrate patch, submarginal, between 

 veins Sand 4 ; a marginal series of small, white spots or dots superposed on 

 a terminal, black band expanding in a slight inward curve across apex. 

 Hind wing : the extreme base of wing black continued by a conjoined, or 

 not, spot in interspace 1 at extreme base, produced outwards and then up 

 through base of cell to vein 8 ; a subbasal, black spot on hinder margin in 

 interspace la ; a broad, black band from hinder margin, medial, in inter- 

 spaces la, 1 and 2, widening out distally ; a large, postmedial spot in inter- 

 space 3, a smaller one beyond in interspace 4 and series of three c(mjoined 

 spots in interspaces 5, 6, 7, that in 7 much the larger and produced broadly 

 and shortly inwards ; a subterminal series, one in each interspace, of 

 black lunules joined at the ends to an anteciliarv fine, black line ; 

 cilia of both fore and hind wings are really brown in their basal 

 halves, whitish-grey above, chequered broadly black at the ends of the 

 veins. Antennae black, finely banded white, the club tipped orange; palpi 

 black above ; head black, the frons white, fringed on each side with black 

 hairs ; the eyes rimmed with white and haired on their surfaces ; thorax 

 and abdomen black above, the former with white hairs, the latter thinly 

 banded with white. Below : palpi, head, thorax and abdomen white. The 

 end joint of the palpi is slightly longer in the female than in the male. 

 Expanse : 28-35 mm. 



The above is more or less the description of a wet-season butterfly. 

 They, however, vary a good deal even in the wet season in the width of 

 the oblique-white band on the upperside and the size of the black patches 

 on the underside. Some specimens have the veins crossing the white band 

 on the upperside of the fore wing black. 



In the height of the dry season the white of the upperside is much 

 broader and occupies quite one-third of the fore wing and more than half 

 of the hind wing, leaving, on the latter, only a very small, black base and a 

 far narrower outer border with a sinus in the inner, medial part and a 

 series of three, white, subterminal spots in interspaces lb, 1 and 2. 

 Underside : Fore wing : a black lunule just inside apex, leaving the apex 

 itself white ; an anteciliary black line with a submarginal series of lunules, 

 their ends touching the anteciliary line— none of these terminal markings 

 are present m the wet-season form ; the black patch on the middle of the 

 outer margin, the upper, postdiscal patch from the costa and the lower. 



