184 LLOYD'S NATURAL HISTORY. 



CHARAXES TIRIDATES. 

 (Plate XX 'VII. , Figs, i, 2.) 



Papilio tiridates, Cramer, Pap. Exot, ii., pi. 161, figs. A. B. 



(1777); Drury, 111. Exot. Ent., iii., pi. 23, figs, i, 2 (1782). 

 Nymphalis tiridates^ Godart., Enc. Meth., ix., p. 354, no. 14 



(1823); Trimen, Rhop. Afr. Austr., p. 172 (1866). 

 Charaxes tiridates^ Staud. Exot. Schmett., i., p. 169, pi. 59 



(1885). 

 ? Papilio marica, Fabr., Ent. Syst, iii. (i), p. 113, no. 346, 



(1793); Donov., Nat. Rep., ii., pi. 37 (1824). 



This species was orginally described by Cramer as from 

 Java and Amboina ; but although he corrected the error in his 

 " Errata," giving the locality as Guinea, subsequent authors per- 

 petuated it, even as late as Westwood in his edition of Drury's 

 "Illustrations of Exotic Entomology," published in 1837, and 

 Duncan in the volume on Exotic Butterflies in the " Natural- 

 ist's Library" 1840. Westwood, indeed, adds the equally erro- 

 neous locality of Rio Janeiro, on the authority of a correspon- 

 dent of Drury's. Since then, however, the insect has become 

 well known as a native of West Africa, and was also described 

 as inhabiting South Africa by Mr. Trimen on Boisduval's 

 authority ; but as he has excluded it from his later works, it 

 is to be presumed that its reputed occurrence in South Africa 

 is more than doubtful. 



The male measures about four inches across the wings, 

 which are of a very deep blue-black, with brown nervures ; 

 and there is a double row of blue spots towards the margins 

 of all the wings. The incisions, and a sub-marginal row of 

 lunules on the hind-wings, are yellowish. On the under sur- 

 face, the wings are of a brownish grey, somewhat glossy, and are 

 ornamented with black streaks and spots edged with blue 

 towards the base, more or less bordered with yellow, and 



