1874. 113 



Note on capture of Papilio Antimachus, Sfc. — I received yesterday from Mr. 

 Rogers, at Fernando Po, a collection of butterflies, interesting chiefly from the large 

 number and remarkable varieties of Acrcea, which seemed to have its head quarters 

 iu that district. Mr. Rogers has at the same time sent me some new species from 

 the Gaboon, with the following interesting account of his capture of Papilio Anti- 

 machus (the "magnus Apollo " of Lepidoptorists) : — 



" I must now teU you about Antimachus. I took it on a small island on the 

 " 14th of March. I saw it on the 13th flying round a high tree where I was not 

 " able to reach it. I watched it all day in the burning sun until quite exhausted. 

 " I could not sleep all night. Next morning I landed on the island early. It was 

 " pouring with rain. I watched round the tree, but saw nothing of it till about two 

 " o'clock, when the sun shone out brightly, and in a few minutes it made its appear- 

 "ance again, but out of my reach. Suddenly the rain came down again, and Anti- 

 " machus flew towards me, and I took it with the first stroke of my net. I felt so 

 " excited that I hardly knew wliat I did, and when I had pinned it in the box I 

 "almost screamed with delight." 



Mr. Rogers has gent me a second collection of butterflies from Fernando Po, 

 containing Papilio Merope and P. Hippocoon, taken by him in copulation, another 

 illustration of the saying that " truth is stranger than fiction." I find it very 

 diflieult (even with this evidence) to believe that a butterfly, which, when a resident 

 in ^ladagascar, lias a female the image of itself, should, iu West Africa, have one 

 witliout any resemblance to it at all.— W. C. Hewitson, Oatlands, Weybridge : 

 \2th A.ugust, 1874. 



Hermaphrodite Oonopteryx rhamni. — When collecting in east Sussex on the 

 IGth instant, I caught a hermaphrodite specimen of &. rhamni. 



The left wings are of the usual sulphur-yellow colour of the male insect, and 

 the right wings are of the usual greenish-wiiite colour of the female. 



The specimen is in fine condition, and had apparently only recently emerged 

 from the pupa. — II. Goss, Brighton : 2()th July, 1874. 



Natural History of Lyccena Adonis. — On 30th August, 1873, Mr. A. II. Jones 

 most kindly sent me two living females of this species, which ho liad just captured 

 at Folkestone. These I placed at once under gauze on a plant of Hippocrepis comosa, 

 and, during the three or four days they remained alive, they laid about twenty eggs. 

 The larvfE, I believe, hatched towards the end of September, but, as I kept them on 

 the growing plant outdoors, I could not see them hatching : in October I found the 

 leaflets of the vetch marked with little whitish dots ; these were caused by the larvra 

 t\iunclling into the under-side, and eating out the inner substance for a small space, 

 leaving tlie upper skin untouched, which then turned white. 



I kept their cage in a garden frame without bottom heat, but in a warm sit nation, 

 and thus sheltered them tlirough the winter, and on sunny days the larva; could bo 

 seen enjoying the heat, stretched out — if that term may bo applied to sucli diminu- 

 tive, dumpy creatures — along the midrib on the upper-side of a leaflet. Up to 

 December they remained less that one-sixteenth of an inch in length, but in January, 

 1874, some were grown to nearly one-twelfth of an inch, and were not only marking 

 the leaflets with larger blotches, but were also beginning to nibble their edges. 



