PARATA. I 7 



" Andaman females all have only a single small semi-transparent 

 subapical speck between the last two branches of the subcostal nervure of 

 the anterior wing ; but those from continental India have sometimes one 

 and sometimes two besides this on the disc of the same wing, which in 

 one from Bangalore in South India, are enlarged into two conspicuous 

 reversed comma-shaped spots." (Wood-Mason and de Niceville, J.A.S.B., 

 1881, p. 254). 



In a Jong series of this species from Madras, the females have one 

 very minute subapical spot, and two prominent spots on the disc, the lower 

 of which is indented outwardly. Both males and females show very little 

 variation in the prominence of the transverse band on the underside, 

 though this is not the case in specimens from the Nilgiris, where alexis and 

 chromus seem to run into one another. 



In collections Indian Museum and de Niceville. 



19. PARATA ALEXIS, FABRICIUS. 



Papilio alexis, Fabricius, Syst. Ent., p, 533 (1775). 



Parata alexis, Moore, Lep. Cey., vol. i., p. 161, pi. 65, fig. 2a ; 2&. 

 (1881). 



" Upperside dark vinaceous olive brown, base of both wings olive 

 green. Male : forewing with a suffused blackish subbasal patch traversed 

 by a curved oblique black glandular streak. Underside vinous brown; 

 costal border of forewing and basal area of hindwing suffused with 

 purplish-blue : hindwing with a broad well-defined transverse white band 

 broken above large blackish anal lobe spot. 



Female. Forewing with two small semi-transparent yellowish discal 

 angular spots. Underside as in male, the forewing also showing the discal 

 spots and a whitish streak along posterior margin. 



Expanse, i| to if inches. 



Smaller than P. chromus, with broader and more prominently marked 

 band on underside of hindwing." (Moore, I. c.) 



Hab. Ceylon (Wade, Mackwood}. 



Also recorded from Mhow, Poona, Bombay, and Karachi (Swinhoe) ; 

 Tret, N.-W. India (Butler) ; Orissa (Taylor) ; Nilgiris (Hampson). 



This species seems to differ in the number of spots on the forewing, 

 I have only two females both obtained at Berhampore in Ganjam. Of 

 these one has two largish discal spots and one small round subapical 

 spot ; the other specimen has the subapical spot and a similar small 

 round one on the disc corresponding to the upper of the two present 

 in the other specimen ; it also has the band on the underside of the 

 hindwing obsolete except towards the anal angle. 



In collections Indian Museum and de Niceville. 



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