lv>08.] 75 



aqave all moisture. It was a little before 4 p.m. on the rather dull 

 afternoon of March 20th, 1907, that I first scrambled up this gully. 

 I had met with a few Ithomiines previously, but only odd ones, here 

 and there ; now it was my pleasure to see what I had read of. 



Bates, in his classical paper on the Heliconiida, writing of the 

 genus Ithomia, says : — " They are prolific insects, and gregarious in 

 their habits, flocks of many different species associating together. 

 Their flight is low and weak ; and they affect only certain parts of 

 the forest, generally shady hollows, where many hundreds may often 

 be seen sporting together, though not an individual is found in any 

 other part of the neighbourhood." — Trans. Linn. Soc, vol. xxiii, 

 p. 539. 



Again :— " The flocks of Butterflies, all of the same colour, and 

 undistinguishable from one another when on the wing, which fly 

 together in the same dry hollows of the forest. . . ." Ibid., 

 p. 541. 



Alongside the right bank of the mountain stream was a com- 

 paratively level strip of ground, some six or eight yards wide, damp, 

 and in placi s swampy, covered for the most part with the " Life- 

 plant " (BryopJiyllum calycinum, Salisb.). The place was over- 

 shadowed by what appeared to be a species of " Coral-tree," or 

 " Bois immortel," as it is called in Trinidad {Erythrina sp.), and there 

 was an undergrowth of Wild Coffee and a few Bamboos. As 

 I pushed along, my movements suddenly disturbed a number of 

 butterflies, which fluttered about in clouds, looking with their trans- 

 parent wings almost like Tipulce, only more ghost-like. Sometimes 

 their wings would catch the light with an iridescent gleam, but more 

 usually little could be seen save the opaque white marks upon their 

 wings. Of course the more thickly scaled forms were more con- 

 spicuous, but as a rule all the black portions of the insects were 

 invisible. It was a wonderful sight, but quite bewildering. Two or 

 three sweeps of the net entrapped a dozen or so. I only took back 

 that afternoon thirty-five specimens, which I imagined included three 

 or four, possibly five or six species. In truth, there were eleven 

 species belonging to eight genera. 



A visit to the same spot the next day produced a similar result, 

 the hour was earlier and the Ithomiines were not so closely packed, 

 yet I took home thirty specimens, which proved to belong to rtine 

 species, three of which I had not taken on the first day. A third 



visit failed to add further to the list which stands as follows : — 



G -z 



