( 440 ) 



of this species from the other Cosmodesmns, I will not enter npon ; bnt I mnst mention 

 that the absence of a subcostal branch was one of the chief characters that iudnced 

 Salvin — who knew the Pajjilios of America very well, and not only their colour, but 

 also their structure — to erect the genus Baronia for a Mexican species, baroni. 



The specialisation in neuration is not the only character in which the Indo- 

 Malayau P. agetes differs widely from the Palaearctic podulirius and the American 

 protesilaifg and bellcropkon, and in which it agrees with antiphates, stratiotes, 

 aristeus, and other species of the Indo-Australian fauna ; but exactly the same close 

 connection is demonstrated by the genital armature, which is at a glance recognisable 

 as being built up after the same type as in agctes, antipkutcs, etc., and after entirely 

 different types in podalirius, protesilaus, etc. While P. agetes stands in grouj) I., 

 the North Bornean P. stratiotes is placed near antip/iates in group II. ; both insects 

 agree, however, so closely with one another, besides in neuration, in the structure of 

 the genital armature and the presence of a large cottony patch in the abdominal 

 fold of the mali:<, and are also in jiattern so similar to each other, that there is no 

 justification whatever for linking agctes to an aberrant American species (hellerophon) 

 and separating it altogether from its very close relative stratiotes. A most remark- 

 able character in jjattern common to the two insects is found by Eimer himself ; that 

 is the presence of a large band in the same place where in the other species band vii. 

 stands, a Ijaud which should really be absent from agetes and stratiotes according 

 to Eimer's " laws " of development. In Orthogenesis, p. 45, it is said that Mr. 

 Rothschild's collections have not brought forward any intermediate forms between 

 agetes, stratiotes, and antiphates. A complete series of intergradations certainly 

 cannot be expected, because the three insects are three very distinct species ; but 

 Mr. Rothschild has shown (Nov. Zool. II. p. 417) that agetes is in pattern to a 

 certain extent connected with stratiotes by the Malayan subspecies P. agctes insularis, 

 and that stratiotes does stand intermediate in pattern between agetes and antiphates. 

 It is ratlier surprising to read (I.e.), re the position of P. agetes, that Eimer finds 

 only general assertions brought forward by Mr. Rothschild instead of facts, if one 

 knows that Mr. Rothschild gave as his reason for placing stratiotes and agetes 

 together that they agree in neuration, in the male scent-organ, and in pattern. 



A second correction made by Mr. Rothschild relating to a sjiccies of Eimer's 

 group I. is also rejected by Eimer. lu Artbildang I. p. 65 we are told, under 

 P. alehion, that " Oberthiir, from the comparison of the figure of Gray, will erect 

 a new species, which he called P. tamerlanus, on the ground of [differences in] colour 

 and the general aspect (I). This tamerlanusis simply an alehion.'" In Nov. ZooL. II. 

 p. 409 it was shown that Eimer made a mistake in identification, Obcrthiir's 

 tamerlanus being different from alehion in the pattern and the shape of the hindwing 

 especially; and Eimer's alehion being this tamerlanus, not Gray's alehion. An error 

 in identification is of no particular weight, and I should not have mentioned the 

 mistake here, if the reply in Orthogenesis, p. 45, were not so significant : " That my 

 alehion be not this, but tamerlanus Oberth., is settled by the fact that one of tlie 

 best informed students of exotic Lepidoptera, Staudinger, does not regard tamer- 

 lanus as specifically distinct, but considers it to be synonymous with alehion; it 

 (tamerlanus) can at the highest certainly only be an ' Abart,' for the separation is 

 founded in Rotlis<'Iiild's tamerlanus on nothing else but the division of the yellow 

 anal spot into two sp<its, a division which occurs also in seasonal varieties of P. a}ax, 

 namely in ivalshi and telamonides — in the latter the spot is sometimes divided 

 sometimes not !"— My answer is : (1) that Dr. Staudinger probably did not know 



