560 Mr. H. J. Elwes on a 



A. niohe is a very wide-ranging species, which varies 

 extremely on the under side, and has developed two or 

 three varieties which are certainly well-marked, and, as 

 far as I know, constant in Asia ; but I have not seen 

 enough of either orientalis or gigantea to speak with 

 certainty of them. 



A. jainadeva, however, the Himalayan form, may, I 

 think, be regarded as a good species, which seems to me 

 as near to aglaia as to niohe. It resembles niohe most 

 on the upper side, especially in the female sex, but differs 

 constantly on the under side in having the hind wing of 

 a greenish tinge towards the base, as in aglaia, with the 

 silver spots of the same, but with the addition of a row 

 of three (sometimes four or five) rufous spots, of which 

 two or three are pupilled with silver, between the outer 

 and next row of silver patches. It never assumes the 

 eris form of niohe, which seems commonest elsewhere, 

 and out of thirteen males and nine females I have none 

 which cannot be distinguished from niohe, of which I have 

 forty from various localities. Jainadeva occurs in the 

 north-western parts of the Himalayas only ; and in the 

 dryer climate of the northern valleys and Ladak assumes 

 a form which is so close to the var. of aglaia found near 

 the same region, that I had for a long time confounded 

 them under the name of vithatha. 



A. adippe is one of the most variable species ; several 

 forms have been included under varietal names by 

 Staudinger, and others described by Butler, but none of 

 them seems to me to be capable of exact definition, and 

 none of them are confined to a particular region, so far 

 as I know. In Japan, Korea, and Amurland all the 

 named forms occur, and Leech says others quite as 

 distinct are also found. As a rule, the eastern and 

 southern specimens are larger, brighter, and the females 

 often darker and more tinged with green, than the 

 European ones. In all my forty male specimens the 

 first median nerve of the fore wing appears strongly 

 dilated for about one-third of its length, and in all but 

 a few specimens from Amurland and Korea the second 

 median vein also seems dilated to a less but usually 

 well-marked extent. 



The apparent dilatation of the median veins in several 

 species of Argynnis is not, as Mr. Jenner Weir has 

 pointed out to me, a fact. It is really due, as Mr. 



