NOTES ON PAPILIO ASTERIAS. 



315 



any time to solve a doubt, know what species it was to which he gave 

 the name. A " type " is a useful accessory but not essential to this 

 end. We will assume he has before him a long series with all sorts 

 of varieties, the name belongs to all, then he fixes a "type" in one, or 

 both, of two ways, he takes a specimen and says this shall be the 

 " type" of my new species. Any one finding he has a specimen of 

 the same species as that type, applies to it the author's name. There 

 is nothing to prevent the author, if he chooses, selecting some extreme 

 aberration as the "type" specimen, he might even reasonably do so, 

 if it happened to exhibit more clearly some specific character he 

 thought important. His other "type" would be by way of description, 

 he ought to describe all the varieties he has, and he may leave them 

 all under one specific name, or he may give varietal names to each, and 

 in doing so may select any variety he chooses as the " type," i.e., as 

 one which he leaves without varietal name. It would be contrary to 

 custom, but I see no reason why he should not give a varietal name to 

 each form, leaving the specific name as equally belonging to all. I am 

 not quite sure, but looking to p. 247, 1 imagine each recognised race of 

 Phrwiwatobia fidiifinosa is provided with a varietal name. 



If it does not exceed the limit prescribed by the editor, I should 

 like to call attention to an almost forgotten paper by Dr. Sharp, in 

 which he suggests the name of a species shall be the oriiiinal name, 

 ijeneric and specific, unchanged. You may then classify as you like. 

 Papilio coccajits remains Fapilio coccajn», though you may clamfy it as 

 an Ascalaphiift. The result, no doubt, would be rather cumbrous, and 

 might be open to charges of trinomial heresy. But fixity of nomen- 

 clature would be more nearly attained, and classifications that became 

 obsolete, could not hamper us more than once for each species. The 

 aim is to separate nomenclature from classification, a quite unessential 

 association, which is the source of many of our difficulties. 



Notes on Papilio asterias, with particular reference to its earlier 

 stages, and their difference from those of P. machaon. 



By CECIL FLOERSHEIM, B.A. 



In the winter of 1903-4 I bought some ten pupte or so of Papilio 

 asterias, the common eastern swallow-tail butterfly of North America, 

 from Messrs. Watkins & Doncaster. At the end of March, 1904, I 

 placed these, with other pupa-, out-of-doors, in my butterfly- house, a 

 slight construction of wood covered with gauze, fifty feet long by fifteen 

 feet wide. This house or cage has a door at either end, and a path a 

 foot wide, running down the middle. On either side of this, for a 

 space of two feet or so, I have planted Erijsiwum, pansy, and other 

 such flowers as butterflies love to feed on ; whilst the remaining ten 

 feet of room are filled in with the foodplants of the various species I 

 attempt to breed. 



In this instance, however, the normal instinct of the butterfly 

 failed it, for the ova, being laid without exception on the bracts 

 underneath the flower-heads of wild chervil, which were already 

 beginning to shed their petals, on the seed-pods, or on the 

 bare stems high above the leaves, were so placed that when they 

 hatched the young larvfe found no sustenance, and being of a 

 sluggish habit, would have starved — which indeed they did in some in- 

 stances — had I not transferred them to fennel and common garden car- 



