The Bionomics of South African Insects. 467 



mimicry, just as it is in Batesian where it has long been 

 recognized, in species of which the female enters into a 

 more or less well-marked membership of a group towards 

 which the male has made no apparent approximation. 

 Numerous examples will be found in the present memoir. 



Tliis interesting similarity between Miillerian and 

 Batesian mimicry was probably unrecognized until 1894, 

 when it was discovered by F. A. Dixey,* because of the 

 fact that in the first-known examples of Miillerian mimicry 

 in tropical America, which are the most wonderful instances 

 in the world, the convergent pairs and groups contributed 

 by the Hcliconimc and Itliomiinai and by different genera 

 within each of these sub-families, are made up of species 

 with males and females which are superficially alike. 



Now, however, that the pi'inciple has been recognized by 

 Dixey in many Neotropical Miillerian mimics with differ- 

 ing sexes and here in many Ethiopian, the explanation is 

 doubtless the same as tliat suggested by Wallace (Trans. 

 Linn. Soc. xxv, Pt. I, 1805) in the case of Batesian mimics, 

 viz. the great importance for the species that the female, 

 with her sloAver flight and the necessity to pause and lay 

 her eggs, should gain to the full the advantages of that 

 extra advertisement of warning coloration which is con- 

 ferred by membership in a synaposematic group. This is 

 the interpretation offered by Dixey in his 1894 memoir 



(q. v.). . 



Neptis agatha exhibits in an interesting manner that 

 concentration of white markings into four large patches, 

 one upon each wing (save that the fore-wing is invaded 

 by a small portion of the hind-wing patch), and that 

 disappearance of the other bars and markings, except 

 for traces on the under-side, which are characteristic of 

 many Ethiopian species of this genus, and doubtless indi- 

 cate a synaposematic approach to the black-and-white 

 species of Aviauris and Flancma of the Region. 



It is too wide a subject to introduce into the present 

 memoir, but I cannot forbear to allude to tlie evident 

 synaposematic sensitiveness of the genus Neptis, leading it 

 to form associations with local conspicuous Rhopalocera. 

 Among the most beautiful of these are N. venilia and i\". 

 lactaria, which resemble the remarkable Danaine genus 

 Hamadryas, especially upon the under-side; Again, the 



* Trans. Ent. Soc. Loud,, 1894, p. 298, note ; 1896, pp. 70, 71 ; 

 1897, pp. 319, 326-328, 330. 



