MIMICRY IN BUTTERFLIES FOR PROTECTION. 171 



the matter to light in 1862. I simply propose to show as many of 

 the types of mimicry as I can from the examples out of my own private 

 collection of butterflies. As to how one butterfly comes to mimic 

 another for protection has been explained by many authors, and not 

 always on the same theory; but I take it that Darwin's explanation 

 that many species of Lepidoptera are liable to considerable and 

 abrupt variations of colour is the keynote of the whole mystery. Let 

 us look at Hypolimnas misippus. The normal form of this butterfly 

 is black, with large white spots on the wings ; the female mimics 

 Danais chrysippus in its colouration and markings, this butterfly 

 being of a bronze-reddish colour. Now the male of Hypolimnas 

 misippus is a very pugnacious insect and is very active, and has a 

 remarkably quick flight, and is therefore capable of protecting itself; 

 it is very good food for birds, lizards, &c, and whenever caught is a 

 delicious mouthful; the female, however, is much slower in flight, 

 and when heavily laden with eggs is easily captured. Danais chry- 

 sippus, on the contrary, like all the Danainas group, is a butterfly 

 that; no bird or lizard will touch, and both these species live in the 

 same places. Now, supposing at some former period, in accordance 

 with the well-known fact that Hypolimnas misippus in common with 

 many species of lepidoptera being liable to considerable and abrupt 

 variation in colour (I myself have a very curiously coloured female 

 of this group), if a female appeared of a reddish or bronzy tinge (a not 

 uncommon occurrence with black butterflies), would itnot be probable 

 that it would have a greater chance of escaping the attacks of birds 

 and lizards than its black sisters ? Some of its progeny would also 

 probably have a bronzy tinge, and these also would have the greater 

 chance to escape, and so on, from generation to generation the more 

 bronzy the offspring became, and the more they resembled the 

 colouration of the protecting species, the more they would become 

 protected themselves, until, in the course of ages, the black form of 

 the female H. misippus would cease to exist and its place would be 

 taken by the beautiful female mimic of Danais chrysippus; and it is 

 curious to observe that the protected and protecting forms are 

 invariably found together. Danais chrysippus is an insect common 

 in many parts of the world, all over India, Burma, and Ceylon, in 

 the Philippine Islands, in Turkey, Madagascar, Arabia, and the west, 

 south, and south-eastern coast of Africa, and in all these places 

 (I am not sure about Turkey) the protected form, Hypolimnus 

 misippus, is also to be found. In Aden and in several parts of 



