I40 SOUTH- ArEICA:tT BUTTEEFLIES. 



streak, edged on both sides by a linear series of small white marks, 

 which on the anterior segments (two to five) are developed into thin 

 transverse strise ; a similar series of minute white spots bounds lower 

 edge of livid-purplish on each side ; below this, each side is olive- 

 greenish ; under side and pro-legs light-green ; head black, shining, 

 striped frontally, superiorly, and laterally with white ; legs pale- 

 greenish, yellowish terminally. Dorsal spines on third to sixth seg- 

 ments considerably longer than the rest, erect, nearly straight, rather 

 thick, with only a terminal bristle, dull-greyish ; other spines through- 

 out yellowish or greenish-white, set with a few whitish bristles ; the 

 dorsal ones inclining backward from the ninth to the anal segments. 

 Length l^ in. Feeds on ; the very young larv^, 



according to Colonel Bowker, advancing in a regular row, side by side, 

 from the base of a leaf, eating away the parenchyma as they proceed. 



Pupa. — Pale orange-yellow. Two dorsal rows of bright orange 

 black-ringed acute tuberculated spots, and on each side a row of 

 similar (but not tuberculated) spots, mark the abdominal segments, 

 some of the incisions of which are dorsally thinly defined with black. 

 Neuration of wings, and a median stripe along back of thorax, and 

 head black ; eyes and lines of antennas and limbs also edged with 

 black. Rather more curved than usual in Acrcea pupee ; back of 

 thorax very prominent, its lateral angles prominent ; cephalic tubercles 

 rather acutely pointed. Length ^ in. 



(Colonel Bowker informed me as to the ground-colour of the pupa, 

 which was much altered in the spirit specimens sent, and scarcely 

 indicated in the single empty pupa skin previously received.) 



A. Cerasa has much the look of an undersized A. Horta (Linn.), especially 

 in the deep-red colour, the spotting of the hind-wing, and the fuscous bases of 

 the wings. In the pattern of the spotting of tlie fore-wing it more resembles 

 A. Neobule, Doubl. The colouring of the abdomen is intermediate in char- 

 acter, the lateral and terminal rufous being much more pronounced and 

 developed than in Horta, but less so (and much deeper in hue) than in 

 Neohule. From both species the absence of any black, pale, spotted hind- 

 marginal border in the hind-wing at once separates Cerasa. Perhaps Cerasa's 

 nearest ally is A. Quirina (Fab.), from Tropical "Western Africa; but the latter 

 differs very markedly in having the entire fore-wing transparent, with only a 

 faint reddish tinge over the inner-marginal area, and in presenting a broad, 

 even, well-defined hind-marginal transparent border in the hind-wing, interiorly 

 bounded by a series of six small black spots. 



Until 1883 this Acrcea was only known to me by the type (a (^ ) in tlie 

 Hewitson Collection, and I felt some doubt whether it was more than a 

 dwarfed aberration of A. Neohule ; but Colonel Bowker changed the aspect of 

 affairs by sending me two $ s, taken on 2d April of that year near Pinetown 

 in Natal. Others were met with by him in the same locality during April, 

 May, and October 1883; and in January 1884 a $ was reared from a larva 

 found in tlie verandah of the house. In the folloAving INIarch Colonel Bowker 

 discovered the larvte on their food-plant, and sent 7ne full-grown specimens (as 

 well as some pupse in spirit) in the May ensuing, followed in June by more of 

 the perfect insect. Among twenty-four examples received, only four were 

 females, one of these being of the unusually large expanse of 2\ inches. 



