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THE RHOPALOCERA OF LORD HOWE ISLAND. 

 By G. a. Waterhouse. 



In my opinion this portion of the fauna of Lord Howe Island 

 has been sadly neglected, and the object of this paper is to aid 

 investigations in the study of the distribution of species. Thei*e 

 are three collections of Loi'd Howe Rhopalocera in Sydney at 

 present. In 1889 in the second Memoir of the Australian Museum 

 a list was given by Mr. A. S. OUiff comprising ten species; these 

 specimens are in the Australian Museum. The second collection 

 is a small one, consisting of five species, in the Macleay Museum, 

 Sydney University. This collection is part of one made by Mr. E. 

 H. Saunders in the early part of 1888, and contains three species 

 not mentioned in Mr. Olliff's list. The remaining collection now 

 in my possession was made by Miss Edith Nichols, a resident of 

 the island, during the years 1896 and 1897, and consists of twelve 

 species, five of which are not represented in either of the pre- 

 ceding collections. The list given by Mr. Olliff comprised all 

 the information up to that date, so it will be seen that I have to 

 record eight species new to the island. 



All the species so far found on the island are common on the 

 Australian continent, and are mostly strong winged insects, such 

 as could easily have flown or been blown across the three hundred 

 miles which intervene between the island and the mainland. One 

 noticeable feature is the absence of any form of the subfamily 

 Sati/rince, but this is scarcely to be wondered at, as these butter- 

 flies are very quiet, and do not soar high, consequently they are 

 not so prone to be distributed over wide areas by the agency of 

 the wind. The Hesperidte are only represented by one small 

 species, and this is a matter of surprise, as the Lord Howe palms 

 are the food-plants of several of the family near Sydney. The 



