59 



be liybrids, and in two instances undoubted males ^?/rj'//^r;«^, one 

 of them fiery-red, the other pale, or the Kcezuaydi)i form, and two 

 yellow females Philodice, with which they were taken in copula- 

 tion. As the red one was so taken by Mr. G. M. Dodge, who gave 

 it to me, there can be no question of the fact of the capture. 

 From what I know of the frenzied eagerness with which certain 

 male butterflies (as I have related in the cases of Papilio Ajax, 

 Can. Ent., 13, 209, and Heliconia CJiaritonia, Papilio 1,213), watch 

 the coming of the females from chrysalis, I am confident that they 

 would seize upon the females of any allied species just as readily, 

 if one of their own were not at hand. If such things occur in the 

 mild climate of the Mississippi valley, where females of jS'^/rj/Z'tv//!? 

 arc as common as the males, what may not occur in a sage-brush 

 desert, with no rain fall and the mercury above loo*^? The pant- 

 ing male cannot fly over hill and valley, under these conditions, seek- 

 ing its mate, as we often see male butterflies doing in a Christian 

 country. Nature impels him, and he captures the first female he 

 meets. That this is the fact in multitudes of cases in that arid 

 district is highly probable, and it will account for all these 

 curious nondescripts taken by Dr. Hagen. 



My summing up is this : i. Zolicaon is a species subject to 

 little variation. It is a member of the Asterias group, forming 

 with Aincricns a sub-group. The other species of the group are 

 divisible into two or more sub-groups, and all these are of equal 

 rank, sprung from a common ancestor. 



2. Orcgoiiia belongs to the Machaon group, and (perhaps 

 with some other species) forms a sub-group of equal rank at least 

 with the sub-group to which the species Machaon belongs. It 

 certainly cannot have been derived from the species Machaon. 



3. Zolicaon and Oregonia being distinct species, in distinct 

 groups, the supposed " intermediate forms " discovered by Dr. 

 Hagen, in a limited and exceptional district, are not intergrades, 

 but, unless they constitute a distinct species by themselves, are 

 of necessity hybrids, and probably between Zolicaon and Oregonia 

 (and, perhaps, Aliaska). 



And, finally, that the grand propositions enunciated by Dr. 

 Hagen : i. That Oregonia and Zolicaon cannot be separated : 

 2. That these forms should be considered as local or climatic 

 varieties of one and the same species, Machaon, fall to the ground. 

 Rcq. in pace. 



In such cases as that of Oregonia, where a well-marked species 

 is only found to exist in a much-restricted area, while its nearest 

 allies flourish exceedingly and occupy a large territory, I hold 

 that the former come of a high antiquity. Any form sprung from 

 an existing one would never have attained specific rank unless 

 specially favored, and it would flourish at the expense of the 



