lo4 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, 1890. 



14 years) I have only procured one specimen of each of these varie- 

 ties ; of the former I caught one in the public gardens at Betul in 

 1886, and of the latter one at the Marble Rocks near Jubbulpore, in 

 the same year. I have a few specimens of "what are undoubtedly D. 

 chrysippns, in which the black coloration at the apex of the forewing 

 is more or less obsolescent, and the red ground shows through ; the 

 gradations between this and the commoner form are almost complete, 

 and pass from the deep black at the apex of the wing of the typical 

 D. chrysippns through others in which the red begins to show through, 

 till in some forms the red predominates and the black consists 

 merely of a border. If either D. alcippus or D. dorippus were a 

 distinct species, it w r ould be found more generally distributed, and 

 there would be no gradation from the type to the variety, the 

 difference would be sharply marked and distinct. It may be that 

 they are "sports" or "aberrations," as are albinoes or melanoids 

 among human beings and other creatures. I have other butterflies 

 which present something of the same variation, for instance, a male 

 Nepheronia gcea, in which the black border to the wings is about twice 

 as broad as it is in an ordinary specimen, and a female Ixias marianne 

 in which the black border of the hindwing suffuses nearly the whole 

 of the wing, nearly obliterating the white, although the same wing 

 on the left side has the border of the normal width. D. chrysippns is 

 the common tawny-red butterfly which one sees almost everywhere, 

 and almost always, with a black apex to the forewing, behind which 

 is a white band. It has a lazy flight and is easily caught. In some 

 favoured spots they swarm in hundreds. The air seems full of them, 

 and they can be seen settled holding on to the extreme ends of twigs 

 or along them, thus trying to make one believe that they are dead 

 leaves. These places are generally warm, dry spots under the shade 

 of large trees. Various other butterflies among the Danaince and 

 Euplicence have the same habit. They are as difficult to kill as the 

 last ; a drop or two of benzine on their bodies, however, soon stops their 

 struggles. D. chrysippns is more or less closely imitated by several 

 other butterflies, the most wonderful being the female of Hypolimnas 

 tnisippus. Col. C. Swinhoe, in one of the former numbers of our 

 Journal (Vol. I., page 169, etseq.), has given some interesting remarks 

 on this instance of mimicry. 



