RHOPALOCEKA MALAYANA. 33I 



(Biggs— coll. Dist.) ; Jobore (Annesley).*— Sumatra (Snellon).— Borneo ; Sarawak (Wallace); San.lakan 

 (Pryer) ; Banjermasin (coll. Dist.). 



This very beautiful butterfly holds an iiitoruicliatc position l)et\vceu the subgenera 

 Ornithoptera and Papilio, but, as argued by Mr. Wallace, it agrees with Oniilhoptera "in tlic 

 form and stoutness of the wings, the long, stout mid curved ant(;niue, tlie red collar and 

 patches at the base of the wings beneath, the abdouiinal lold, and Ibe flight and "eneral 

 appearance."! For many years the female was quite unknown, and tbough contained in some 

 very few collections was subsequently first described by Air. P. H. Gosse. I It is still, however, 

 exceedingly scarce. Mr. Low, the Resident at Perak, tbrough whose kind assistance the first 

 examples of this species from the Peninsula reached my bands, wrote to Mr. Logan that the 

 specimens were all males, as " the females are rarely met with." Two females only have 

 passed through my hands, one belonging to Mr. Godfery, and the other (now contained in my 

 own collection) having been captured by Mr. R. D. Hewett at Kinta, in Perak, and that the 

 only example amidst a collection of some hundred male specimens. Herr Kimstler, who has 

 spent some time in Perak collecting Natural-History specimens, has forwarded me the following 

 information as to the species :§—" During the last five years I have caught over a thousand 

 males, and about fifteen females only. On some days the males are very plentiful ; a man may 

 catch as many as fifteen to twenty in a day. On other days they are not to be seen. I have 

 only seen them in the Kinta district in Perak nearly all the year round, but principally in 

 March, April, May and June, in showery weather, when they are to be seen flying over muddy 

 streams (coming from the tin mines) with overhanging jungle. They generally resort to spots 

 where there is decayed animal matter, and may, in fact, be enticed to those spots if the same 

 is suitably prepared. Have never bred any, but have once observed a female laying one egg 

 on a creeper ; — the egg was lost on my removing. The female is so scarce that during the 

 three months in which, with the assistance of three men, I obtained over 800 males, I did not 

 get a single female, and only saw during that period from twenty to tbirty females, which were 

 flying high and settled only on flowers on high trees. The bait which attracted the males 

 never attracted the females, which fly mostly by themselves, and seldom near the males, 

 excepting when the latter are in pursuit of them." 



Mr. F. W. Burbidge, during his travels in Borneo, observed this species in abundance. 

 He writes : — "Now and then the most splendid Ornithoptera are seen, their strong and swift 

 flight resembling that of a bird. One lovely fellow, fully six inches across the wings, settled 



on my boot as I remained motionless watching it These delicate insects are generally 



most numerous by rivers, or in sunny places by the dry beds of streams, and, singularly 

 enough, are most abundant during the cool wet monsoon." || 



This butterfly, in the male sex at least, will soon be a drug in collections. Thousands 

 have been recently sent to Europe, and I was lately told by an extensive cabinet and 



=■' I record a capture of the species at Johore on the authority of a commuuicatiou from Mr. Godfery. 

 + Trans. Linn. Soc. vol. xxv. p. 41 (1866). | ' Entoniolof,nst,' vol. xiv. p. 156 (ISbl). 



§ This information was forwarded in 1883. || ' Tlie Gardens of the Sun,' p. 2C0. 



