— hp 
the Butterflies of Mauritius. 343 
known of the butterflies inhabiting those islands, as well as Mada- 
gascar itself,* tends to establish an opposite conclusion. 
The only indication} of connexion with typical Asiatic forms 
is to be found in the two Euple@e, E. Euphone of Mauritius and 
L. Goudotii of Bourbon, but neither species is known to inhabit 
Asia, the latter being a native of Natal, and the former of Mada- 
gascar and (if I am correctly informed as to Dr. Burrowes’ col- 
lection) of Zanzibar. 
It is reasonable to suppose that the collections of M. Maillard 
and others have made fully known to us the Rhopalocera of 
Bourbon, and it thus becomes interesting to note any differences 
which occur between them and those found in the neighbouring 
island. The two islands are not unlike in general character, and 
are of nearly equal size, but Bourbon is much more rugged, with 
mountains of greatly higher elevation, and possesses at least one 
active volcanic centre. But twenty-two species of butterflies are 
recorded as natives of Bourbon, and eighteen of these are also 
found in Mauritius. Of the remaining four, two, Papilio dispa- 
rilis and Neptis Dumetorum, seem to be peculiar to the island; a 
third, Lycena Mylica, recorded by Guénée in M. Maillard’s 
volume, is quite unknown to me; and the fourth, Eupleea Goudotii, 
as already stated, is African. A certain parallelism is observable 
between the species of either island which are not found in the 
other; thus, in Bourbon, Papilio disparilis takes the place which 
in Mauritius is occupied by P. Phorbanta ; Euplea Goudotii takes 
that of Z. Huphone; while Neptis Dumetorum fairly represents N. 
Frobenia. For the Mauritian Danais Phcedone no analogue appears 
to exist; and, similarly, the Bourbon Lycena Mylica finds no 
answering species in Mauritius. 
It is much to be regretted that no record exists of the butter- 
flies inhabiting Rodriguez, the third and smallest island of the 
group, which lies much further to the eastward; for there can be 
little doubt that an island which can boast its own Dodo, as well 
* See my paper ‘‘ On the Butterflies of Madagascar,” in the “ Quarterly 
Journal of Science,’’ 1864, p. 648. 
+ The two species of Neptis can hardly be held to be evidence of Indian 
relations ; for, though the genus is far more fully represented in South-eastern 
Asia than in Africa, both N. Frobenia and Dumetorwm belong to the African 
group of Neptis, which wants the longitudinal stripe from the base of the 
fore-wings, and includes such species as N. Melicerta, Fabr. (= Agatha, Cram.) 
of Western, Southern and Eastern Africa; N. Saclava, Boisd., of Southern 
and Eastern Africa; and N, Ophione, Cram., of Western Africa. 
