PAPILIO. — By Dr. A. Seitz. 9 



P. alcinous King is a black, geographicallj- variable, Papilio which inhabits the Pacific district of 

 the Palaearctic Region , bearing a row of red or buffish submarginal spots on the hindwing. The first 

 described form is alcinous KJitg fspathatus Butl.-. haematostictus Butl.) (2a). cf above entirely black, frons also alcinous. 

 black, only the body beneath and the underside of the hindwing spotted with red; the latter bears small red 

 submarginal halfmoons. In the ? the ground-colour is dust -grey, and in place of the halfmoons there are 

 grey band-like spots; the July specimens are the smallest (2b). Japan. — confusus Rothsch. (2c) is the form confusus. 

 from the Continent; it is distributed from Shantung southwards to Yunnan; it has a red spot on the frons 

 or at least a few red hairs and its ?? are dark brown; the submarginal halfmoons are moreover in the ? nar- 

 rower and bright red. — plutonius Oberth. (2 c), from the interior of China and Tibet, is stouter in appearance, plutonius. 

 has more rounded tails and paler undei'side to the hindwing. — daemonius Alplier. {= fatuus Rothsch.) are daemonius. 

 names given bj' Alpheraky and Rothschild to specimens from Tibet and Ta-tsien-lu with less dentate hind- 

 wings and whitish scent-wool in the anal fold of the hindwing. — loochooanus Rothsch. (2d) is the island- 'ooc/!ooan«s. 

 form from Liu-Kiu, in which the frons has not only a red spot but is entirely red, and in which the ?? 

 are not dark brown as in conju^ii^, but dust-grey as in a/ciiioicf. — impediens R()fli:<ch. (3a), from Ta-tsien-lu, has impediens. 

 likewise an entirely red head, differs, however, in the hindwing being very narrow. — mencius Feld. (2b) mencius. 

 is a Chinese insect resembling confusus, but is paler and the wool in the anal fold of the hindwing is greyish 

 white, not blackish brown. — All the forms of the uJcinuus-gYOW]} are in their habits the same. The sluggish 

 ?? sit in the grass; they appear to take very little food and do not tly much. ]\luch more numerous are 

 the cfcf, which flutter about searching in their slow tumbling flight for the 2, with which they enter into 

 copulation, often sitting like Nocturnals on the ground. The caterpillars have almost the appearance of a 

 mulberry twig, with red tubercles on a black ground; they live especially on Cocculus thunbergi, appearing 

 in the warmer districts of their range in at least two generations; the butterflies are extremely common, 

 frequent however certain special stations. The species is almost exclusively Palaearctic, only a few forms 

 entering the most northern districts of the Oriental Region. 



Subgenus: Papilio s. s. Swallowtails. 



Haase calls this group "Rinnenfalter" i. e. fluted Swallowtails. The anal area of the hindwing being very 

 narrow in these insects, in a number of species even almost entirely reduced, the abdominal margin of the hindwing 

 appears longitudinally fluted or grooved, especially on the underside. But this character is only superiicial. In 

 reality we are dealing here with insects totally different from those of the preceding subgenus. We do not find 

 here the gummy and oily substance of the body of the Aristolochia - Swallowtails , and there is no approach to the 

 tenacity of life of those insects. If one squeezes a Swallowtail of the present group between the fingers, the brittle 

 thorax cracks and the insect is dead or at least dying, even if the pressure was rather slight, the individual not 

 being able to recover, whereas an Aristolochia -Papilio, if not too strongly squeezed, flies briskly away as soon as 

 one releases it. The caterjjillars of this group have never the fleshy tubercles of the previous subgenus , but are 

 always smooth, green or variegated, when adult. The chrysalids moreover are not widened out so as to assume 

 the shape of a shell, but are almost cylindrical, having about the shape of the chrysalis of Vanessa, with two obtuse 

 frontal processes. The Butterflies are i)artly common, partly rare; they are easy and fast fliers. The caterpillars 

 do not live on poisonons plants, but mostl}' on fruit-trees, also on Umbelliferae. While the Aristolochia-Papilios are 

 totally absent from Europe as well as Africa, the true Swallowtails are found in all Regions. 



P. janaka Moore (Ic). The first described form of this insect, which is black in both sexes, having /«"«/<'«. 

 white-spotted hindwings, inhabits North India, where it is hardly possible to distinguish it on the wing from 

 one of the Aristolochia-Papilios of that district, P. (iri^italochiai'. In the Palaearctic Region, however, 

 where the poisonous P. aristolochiae does not occur, the likewise poisonous P. mi'itc.ius being found instead, 

 our P. janaka bears like this model a uniformly black upperside, the red submarginal halfmoons of the hind- 

 wing being vestigial and the large white spots absent. This very rare Butterfly has l)een named l)y Roth- 

 schild P. janaka dealbatus (3a). Though the body itself is less red than in /'. inencii/^, the breast also not 

 being spotted with red, the red colour is found instead on the portion of the wings nearest the body, form- 

 ing on the underside at the base of the forewiug and along the abdominal margin of the hindwing vari- 

 ously shaped stripes or spots. — The type - specimen (from which our flgure has been taken) is in the 

 Tring-Museum ; the habitat seems to be exclusively Se-tschuen. 



P. nigricans Ruthsrli. (3a) stands in the same relation to the Iiulian P. huofi'S TJ>.s7/c. as P. dea/bafas nigricans. 

 does to P. janaka. Black above, with a few red lunules at the anal angle: forewing spotted with red at 

 base beneath. As in the preceding the ? is unknown, the cTcf appearing also to be rare. — Se-tschuen, 

 possibly also Tibet. 



P. elwesi Leech (5 a). This veiy rare Butterfh', which differes from all other Papilios of the globe elwesi. 

 in the tail of the hindwing being so dilated that two veins are necessary to support it, inhabits the Interior 

 of China. I received the specimen figured from Captain Jankowski with the information that the insect is 

 extremely rare at J-tchang on the Yang-tse-Kiang. The species is also mentioned from Kiukiang (Roth- 

 schild). Its occurrence is presumably restricted to the Palaearctic Region. 



