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



Sind. In this place, the insect is locally plentiful, being restricted, 

 as far as I have observed, to two small areas of rather more than one 

 acre in extent. The country, for some miles round, furnished no 

 specimens. The imago is too well-known to need a further descrip- 

 tion here, but I have shown in the plate, figs. 7, 8 and 9, the upper 

 sides of male and female and underside of a female. They are 

 generally seen in small groups of three or four, settling on or 

 fluttering round low bushes or herbs at the corners of inter- 

 secting pathways or roads. The ovae are deposited usually on a 

 dead twig in juxtaposition to the food plant or they may be laid on 

 the bract at the base of a leaf-stalk. On the 5th day the larvae hatch 

 out. When the larva is at rest it will project the tongue-like processes 

 in and out, about every ten seconds, and will continue doing so for 

 long periods. I was not able to determine whether this action was 

 protective in nature or for the purpose of signaUing up ants. I know 

 that it Avas carried on for a long time preparatory to spinning the 

 cocoon. Like most lycsenid larvae these are always attended by 

 ants and this fact is of great use in searching for them, as it is easier 

 to notice the ants than to see the larvae. When moulting the larvae 

 spin two or three leaves together in which they lie until the change 

 is effected. Often two or three will go into partnership to build this 

 temporary cocoon, but as soon as the cocoon is finished the partner- 

 ship is dissolved, and they wander off in different directions. The 

 partnership is almost invariably brought about by the agency of 

 ants, who pilot the larvae to a suitable spot. The final cocoon is 

 but a little more compact than the temporary ones and usually 

 consists of two leaves loosely woven together and open at both ends. 

 The pupa is firmly fixed by the tail to one portion of the cocoon. It 

 hatches out in from ten days to some weeks, this depending on the 

 season. The foodplant is Cassia and they show a partiality to the 

 young buds." It is probably C. fistula or auriculata. 



28. Genus Chliarta. 



" As restricted by me,the genus ChUaria contains but four species, one of which 

 C. cacJiara, Moore, seems to me to be very doubtfully distinct. . .The four species 

 that are left in ChUaria, are small insects with the ground-colour of the upper- 

 side black; in the male of C. othona, Hewitson, the basal half of the fore wing and 

 nearly the entire hind wing is pale blue ; the fore wing glossed with rich purple- 

 blue, especially on the outer black portion in some lights ; the underside is white 



with ochreous, brown and white spots and bands The females of othona 



and kina differ widely from their respective males, being dull fuscous on the 

 upperside without any trace of blue, the discal areas in both wings being 



whitish in ktna, which is also, sometimes, the case in othona " 



{de. Niceville, Butt, of I., B. and C). 



De Niceville also says that no transformations have been described but 

 mentions that the larva of othona was once found feeding on an orchid. This 

 discrepancy has since been remedied for othona has now been very frequently 

 bred, first by E. H. Aitken at Castle Rock in North Kanara District on the 

 borders of Goa in the Western Ghats of Bombay ; subsequently by others in the 



