On the Butterfiies of the Transvaal. 47 



VIII. — The Butterflies of the Transvaal. 

 By W. L. Distant. 



That troublesome region now known as the Transvaal 

 Republic affords little satisfaction to the zoologist who 

 attempts to isolate and describe its fauna. It has no dis- 

 tinctive f'aunistic element, and in zoogeograpliy is merely 

 part of the present somewhat ill-defined and less understood 

 South-African division of the Ethiopian Region. In 1875 

 Dr. Sclater was inclined to define the South-African division 

 as roughly embracing the *' Cape Colony and adjoining- 

 districts," and as distinct from the South-western and South- 

 eastern divisions. But geographical discovery and coloniza- 

 tion have since then been the means of enlarging our collec- 

 tions and adding to our knowledge of the zoology of this now 

 better known and less dark continent. In I8^i6 Mr. W. L. 

 Sclater, in his series of articles on ''The Geography of 

 Mammals" *, defined the " Cape Subregion " as " including 

 all Africa south of the watershed of the Congo on the West 

 and of the Tana on the East Coast " — a homogeneous area 

 even then none too large, and one which that high authority 

 Dr. P. L. Sclater remarked to the writer might well include 

 Somaliland. If this is true when mammals are studied, it is 

 very evident when the butterflies of Africa are examined, and 

 can be verified by consulting the series of papers which 

 Dr. Butler has contributed to the Zoological Society during 

 the last few years on the Lepidoptera of British East Africa 

 and Somaliland. 



The Transvaal has almost two butterfly faunas. Tlie 

 desolate plains or veld, typical of tlie best known and most 

 frequented areas, can in no sense be described as an entomo- 

 logical paradise ; but the northern and eastern frontiers, such 

 as the Zoutspanberg and Barberton districts, possess Rho- 

 palocera rich in number and subtropical in facies. A moderate 

 belt of bush or forest extends along the East Coast from 

 Delagoa Bay to and beyond Natal, and this warm forest- 

 region is more or less represented in the East and North-east 

 Transvaal. 



The first real contribution to a knowledge of the butterflies 

 of the Transvaal was given by the Swedish lepidopterist 

 Pastor H. D. J. Wallengren, who worked out a collection 

 made by N. Person f, and other species have been from time 



* * Geographical Journal,' vol. vii. p. 262. 



t " Insecta Transvaaliensia," Gr^tVei-jjigt af ktiug-l. Vetenskaps-Acade- 

 niiens Forhandlingar, 1875, p. 83. This collection, I learn from Dr. Auri- 



