PAPILIO IX. 



taken in our Sievras and in Colorado, have strayed from their original birth- 

 place. I have seen it now from Mendocino County ; from Knight's Valley, in 

 Sonoma County ; and the examples taken by Mr. Dwindle were taken near the 

 fisliing-station. McCloud River, Shasta Comity. Now these localities are all in 

 what is called the Coast Range of mountains, lying far west of the Sierra Ne- 

 vada, but connected with this range here and there b}' ridges of hills. Kni<'-lit's 

 Valley is only about 350 feet above the sea, McCloud River about 1,000, and the 

 sunnnit of the Sierra, where I saw the examples in July, about 8,000, so that 

 the species varies much as to its altitude." 



Mr. Mead, who collected in northern Colorado for several months, in 1871, did 

 not encounter this species there, nor did Lieut. W. L. Carpenter, U. S. A., who 

 subsequently made extensive collections, both in northern and in southern Col- 

 orado; and Mr. H. K. MorrLson, who brought, in 1877, an innnense collection of 

 butterflies from southern Colorado, saw nothing of Iiidni. Nor has it appeared 

 from New Mexico, Arizona, or Montana. The metropolis of the species seems 

 to be in western California, as stated by Mr. Henry Edwards. 



The principal difference between Indni and Brcvicauda, apart from the absence 

 of orange in the former, and the presence of this color in a varied and often ex- 

 cessive degree in the latter, and which may be owing to climatal eifect, consists 

 in the markings of the abdomen and in the length of the tail. In Iiidra the ab-. 

 domen of the male is wholly black, excejiting a yellow stripe on the side near 

 extremity ; in the female this is shown to be part of a stripe which extends the 

 length of the abdomen, but which, except just at the extremity, is faint and 

 nearly obsolete. This stripe on an otherwise black body is a characteristic of 

 ZoVicaon, aiul is there distinct. But in the Asterias group, while the body is 

 black, instead of a lateral stripe, tliere are lines of small yellow spots, and these 

 ».ve fowwA m Brevlcauda. At the opposite extreme ivom. Aster' ias.MachaonXmn 

 the abdomen lilack above, but elsewhere yellow, with narrow lateral and vertical 

 black lines. All these species, except Asterias, have the markings of the wing- 

 alike in both sexes, but in the latter species there is much difference in this re- 

 spect. The series runs Machaon, ZoVicaon, Indra, Brevicanda, Asterias. 



The resemblance between Indra and Brecicauda, one at the extreme West, the 

 other at the extreme East, and both restricted to very narrow limits, is sugges- 

 tive of a period when both were represented by a single species which occupied 

 the northern parts of the continent. This struck me when considering the 

 peculiarities and the isolation o[ Brecicauda, and when I had only that species in 

 view, and now the study of Indra seems to render the conclusion to which I 

 then inclined more probable, — that these two species represent most nearly 

 the primitive form from which the 3Iachaon and Asterias groups have de- 

 scended. 



