Rhopalocera from the Australian region. 167 
side of the water-course, while a beautiful male hovered 
just above her. I gave my net to one of the natives, as 
I thought I could not scramble across quick enough, and 
told him to catch the ‘big fellow.” Over he went, and 
crept up stealthily within two yards of them, made a 
deliberate stroke at the female as she sat upon the twig, 
and, to my intense disgust, missed her clean. I felt so 
mortified and so angry at having sent the savage instead 
of going myself, but I thought he would be much 
quicker, and was afraid the butterflies would fly away. 
Just after this misfortune T., with his natives, arrived 
on the scene with eight megapodes and various other 
birds, and we sat down and made a kind of afternoon 
tea of our remaining sandwiches and Australian wine. 
While so engaged I happened to look round, and there 
were two Ornithoptera, male and female, flying quite low 
in the scrub just behind us. I jumped up, seized my 
net, and ran towards them, tumbling over a stump in 
the way, but picked myself up again not much the worse. 
As I drew near I moved more cautiously, and was pleased 
to see the female alight upon a large Aristolochia 
leaf, while the male remained hovering about a yard 
above her. Advancing as quietly as possible I got 
within reach, made a stroke, and had her safely. It 
would have been dangerous to have attempted to catch 
both at the same time. This female was a very large 
and fine example, and quite perfect. After killing her I 
pinned her to a twig in a conspicuous place on the 
outskirts of the scrub, hoping that she would attract 
some of the males, but, after waiting in the shade for 
more than half an hour, and no males appearing, I 
boxed her, and we proceeded through the bush towards 
our boat. We had not walked far when | saw a beautiful 
pair of our friends flying slowly towards us, the male 
“toying” after the female. I stood quite still, and they 
flew right at me, and I successfully netted the female. 
She was quite perfect. Soon after this we noticed 
another pair in the scrub, but they were in a difficult 
place to get at; so I sent a native after them, with 
instructions to capture the male if possible, for I noticed 
that the female was torn. He got quite near them, and 
was lucky enough to secure the male, which proved to 
be a fine fresh specimen. It was about four o'clock 
when this last Ornithoptera was taken; so it appears 
