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VI. Note on Tachyris melania of Fabricius. By 



W. H. MiSKIN. 



[Bead December 5tli, 1883.] 



This species is very briefly characterised by Fabricius in 

 Syst. En., p. 475, n. 140 (1775), and is figured by Dono- 

 van, Ins. N. Holland, t. 17, fig. 2 (1805). The type is 

 in the Banksian collection in the British Museum, and 

 is referred to by the late Mr. Hewitson, Trans. Ent, Soc. 

 Lond., 1868, p. 99, and is refigured and redescribed by 

 Mr. Butler in ' Cruise of Curagoa,' p. 471, pi. 49, figs. 

 4, 5 (1873). 



The fact of the existence of the type seems to have 

 been overlooked by Mr. Wallace in his paper on Eastern 

 Pieridcs, Trans. Ent. Soc. Lond., 3rd ser., vol. iv., p. 371 

 (1867), where he proposes to drop the Fabrician name 

 altogether, as being a species "which has never yet been 

 proj)erly identified, and probably never will be." 



I am glad to be able to throw a little additional light 

 on this species. I have in my possession, from Cape 

 York, specimens of both sexes, or at least what is 

 certainly the female, and, I have no doubt, the opposite 

 sex also. 



Mr. Butler's description and figure enable me to deter- 

 mine my specimen of the female beyond question (he, 

 however, describes the specimen in the Banksian col- 

 lection erroneously as a male ; it is undoubtedly the 

 female). The only difierence to be discerned between my 

 specimen (female) and Butler's figure and description is 

 that in mine the expanse of wing is rather less, rather 

 less white in primaries (occasioned by the outer marginal 

 band being continued to hinder angle, and the somewhat 

 increased dark basal area), the apical spots being con- 

 tinued in a row nearly to hinder angle ; in secondaries 

 by the white area extending nearly across the wing, and 

 on the under side of primaries the base being greenish 

 yellow instead of orange ; in all other respects it exactly 

 agrees, the generally distinguishing feature of the species 

 being the predominating uniform grey-blue tint of the 



TEA.NS. ENT. SOC. LOND. 1884. PART I. (APRIL.) 



