140 Sumatra. 



by birds, and by so closely resembling these in form and color 

 the female of Memnon and its ally also escape persecution. 

 Two other species of this same section (Papilio antiphus and 

 Papilio polyphontes) are so closely imitated by two female 

 forms of Papilio theseus (which comes in the same section 

 with Memnon) that they completely deceived the Dutch ento- 

 mologist De Haan, and he accordingly classed them as the 

 same species. 



But the most curious fact connected with these distinct 

 forms is that they ai-e both the offspring of either form. A 

 single brood of larvae were bred in Java by a Dutch entomol- 

 ogist, and produced males as well as tailed and tailless fe- 

 males, and there is every reason to believe that this is always 

 the case, and that forms intermediate in character never oc- 

 cur. To illustrate these phenomena, let us suppose a roaming- 

 Englishman in some remote island to have two wives — one a 

 black-haired red-skinned Indian, the other a woolly-headed 

 sooty-skinned negress ; and that instead of the children being 

 mulattoes of brown or dusky tints, mingling the characteris- 

 tics of each parent in varying degrees, all the boys should be 

 as fair-skinned and blue-eyed as their father, while the girls 

 should altogether resemble their mothers. This would be 

 thought strange enough, but the case of these butterflies is yet 

 more extraordinary, for each mother is capable not only of 

 producing male offspring like the father, and female like hei'- 

 self, but also other females like her fellow-wife, and altogether 

 differing from herself ! 



The other species to which I have to direct attention is the 

 Kallima paralekta, a butterfly of the same family group as our 

 Purple Emperor, and of about the same size or larger. Its up- 

 per surface is of a rich purple, variously tinged with ash color, 

 and across the fore wings thei'e is a broad bar of deep orange, 

 so that when on the Aving it is very conspicuous. This species 

 was not uncommon in dry woods and thickets, and I often en- 

 deavored to capture it without success, for after flying a short 

 distance it would enter a bush among dry or dead leaves, and 

 however carefully I crept up to the spot I could never discov- 

 er it till it would suddenly start out again and then disappear 

 in a similar place. At length I was fortunate enough to see 

 the exact spot where the butterfly settled, and though I lost 



