70 



NATURE 



[March i6, 191 i 



change between academic and industrial posts; many 

 men leave chairs to become managers of factories; 

 many men enter the teaching and investigating pro- 

 fession from factories. Chemical and physical fac- 

 tories, too, there form a training school for the younger 

 scientific experts ; where many are employed, the more 

 advanced communicate their knowledge and the results 

 of their experience to the junior members of the 

 scientific staff; in fact, they have apprenticeship at its 

 best. Here, in prosperous times, the manufacturer 

 thinks that he has no need of scientific assistance ; in 

 times of bad trade he believes that he cannot afford 

 it. And, lastly, the process of training the.people has 

 gone on in Germany for nearly a hundred years. 

 Rewards have been given, not to successful examiners, 

 and not in the form of scholarships; but have been 

 earned in the battle of life, for which ample prepara- 

 tion has been given. 



This spirit of trust in science has permeated to the 

 highest in the land ; that it has been fertile in practical 

 results is amply proved by the inception of the Kaiser- 

 VVilhelm Society for the furtherance of science. 



MIMICRY IN THE BUTTERFLIES OF 

 AFRICA. 



African Mimetic Butterflies ; being Descriptions and 

 Illustrations of the principal known instances of 

 Mimetic Resemblance in the Rhopalocera of the 

 Ethiopian Region, together with an Explanation of 

 the Miillerian and Batesian Theories of Mimicry, 

 and some account of the Evidences on which these 

 Theories are based. By H. Eltringham. Pp. 136 + 

 X plates and map. (Oxford : Clarendon Press, 19 10.) 

 Price 50S. net. 



THIS valuable work is in chief part devoted to 

 the " Descriptions of Mimetic Associations in 

 African Rhopalocera," illustrated by nine beautiful 

 coloured plates (ii-x) and by a most useful map of 

 Africa. This — the main object of the book^ — is pre- 

 ceded by an excellent introductory account of the 

 structure and classification of butterflies, and of 

 mimicry and its relationship to other uses of form, 

 colour, and pattern. The introduction is illustrated 

 by the admirable first plate, showing the characters 

 of the fore-feet of the principal butterfly groups. The 

 discussion of special objections to the theories of 

 mimicry, and a consideration of the evidence by which 

 they are supported, are wisely left to the concluding 

 pages of the text. A useful bibliographical list and 

 an excellent index complete the work. 



The extraordinarily rapid growth of knowledge on 

 this subject at the present day is seen in the fact 

 that important new light has been already thrown 

 on certain conclusions in the few months that have 

 elapsed since the appearance of the volume. Thus 

 on p. 31 we read of the family raised by Mr. St. 

 Aubyn Rogers from a female Hypolimnas misippus 

 somewhat intermediate between the type and the form 

 inaria, and of how the females, without exception, 

 turned out to be inaria. But since the day of publica- 

 tion Mr. Rogers has bred in the same locality, Rabai, 

 near Mombasa, another family from an inaria female 

 parent, and in this instance all the female offspring 

 were misippus ! It should be mentioned in connection 

 NO. 2159, VOL. 86] 



with this hitherto unpublished result that misippus 

 and inaria females are about equally common in thf 

 locality where the families were reared. 



Again, when the book was published it was safe ' 

 to assert (on p. 96) that the planemoides female form 1 

 of Papilio dardanus is restricted to the areas where 

 its Flanema models are abundant; but Mr. Rogers 

 has now sent an example of it from the neighbourhood 

 of Rabai, and Mr. G. F. Leigh an evidently closely 

 allied very rare form from Durban, the former much 

 to the east, the latter immensely to the south of any 

 locality from which the models have been recorded. 



Then the comparatively few African examples of 

 mimicry within the Nymphalinae have been increased 

 by the recent observations of Mr. W. A. Lamborn that 

 Diestogyna gambiae, the female of which resembles 

 the abundant Catuna angustata, is constantly to be 

 found in the company of this species. 



Our knowledge of mimicry in Africa is progressing 

 at a very rapid rate. To name only the principal 

 naturalists who are directing their attention to this 

 subject at the present moment, we have Mr. A. D. 

 Millar and Mr. G. F. Leigh in Natal, Mr. C. F. M. 

 Swynnerton in south-east Rhodesia, Mr. St. .Aubyn 

 Rogers in the Mombasa district, Mr. C. A. Wiggins 

 at Entebbe, and Mr, W. A. Lamborn in the Lagos 

 district. The present writer has found it most in- 

 spiring to be associated with all these keen observers 

 and to receive many times in each year the tidings 

 of new discoveries and the material on which they 

 were based. 



Mr. Eltringham 's work will be of the utmost assist- 

 ance to these and other naturalists, and it is to be 

 hoped that It will be available in every African centre 

 accessible to students of nature. 



It will also be clear from the brief account of the 

 plan and contents of the work that it is certain to 

 be quite as valuable and efficient in stimulating and 

 guiding the beginner as in aiding the expert in the 

 search for fresh discoveries. 



A careful and critical study has revealed compara- 

 tively few mistakes. All that have been detected are 

 mentioned below, and in a book so full of statements 

 of fact, the list must be regarded as a short one. 



In mentioning Cethosia (p. 39, n. 2), the Oriental 

 mimic of Danaida, it would have been well to point 

 out that we here meet with one of the very rare in- 

 stances of mimicry in the male, but not in the female. 

 The mimicry is confined to the upper surface, and 

 can hardly be looked upon as " remarkably accurate " 

 in any species of this genus. 



The male of Planema inacarista should have been 

 mentioned on p. 45 as a model of the aurivillii form 

 of female of Acraea alciope. In both shape of wings 

 and pattern the resemblance to this Planema is closer 

 than to P. poggei, the model given by the author — 

 a conclusion very clearly expressed in the arrangement 

 of plate viii., but inadvertently omitted from the text. 



In discussing, on p. 52, the scanty and somewhat 

 imperfect mimicry of the abundant Danaine, Tirumala 

 petiverana, the author omits the important considera- 

 tion that the species is a recent intruder from another 

 area — an intruder still retaining a close resemblance 

 to its nearest Oriental allies. 



