326 SOUTH- AFRICAN BUTTERFLIES. 



row of five silvery spots, black-edged on both sides, of wliicli the upper- 

 raost is very much the largest ; beyond middle a continuous, wide, sub- 

 macular silvery band, with its very irregular inner edge interruptedly 

 marked with black ; inner-marginal area dull-silvery, with two small 

 black spots before middle, and a black line (longitudinal) between sub- 

 median and internal nervures ; three small black spots along costa 

 before middle ; hind- marginal border immediately preceded by a series 

 of fuscous-edged lunulate spots, of which the second (largest, between 

 subcostal nervules) and fifth are silvery, and the rest salmon -red; 

 border itself greyish-silvery, its contained spots creamy-white tinged 

 with ochreous-yellow, and ringed (near anal angle very distinctly) with 

 black enclosing a very thin line of bluish-silvery ; indenting silvery 

 discal band externally, a series of inter-nervular thin brown rays. 



$ Similar, hut paler and duller ; the oiUer markings fuscous ; spots 

 in hind-marginal lorder larger. Hind-iuing : an irregular transverse 

 row of seven spots (sublinear except the subannular large spot on 

 costa) extending to below first median nervule. Under side. — As in 

 ^, but paler throughout. 



Head tawny above, with four white spots ; palpi tawny above, black 

 laterally, white below, — the terminal joint black throughout. Thorax 

 tawny above ; collar with a white spot on each side ; below, brown 

 with a broad white breast-stripe (longitudinal), and seven or eight 

 different- sized white spots on each side; legs whitish. Abdomen tawny 

 above ; below with a creamy dark-bordered stripe down the middle. 



A $ specimen from the Zambesi, in the South- African Museum, has the 

 ground-colour darker on both upper and under surfaces, and the silvery band 

 beyond middle of hind-wing much narrower and more macular. (It was on a 

 Zambesi specimen that Professor West wood founded his Charaxes Argynnides.) 



Until Colonel Bowker found this curious little Cliarazes in Kaffraria in 

 the year 1862, the only specimen known to me was one presented to the 

 British Museum by Sir Andrew Smith. Mrs. Barber also sent the butterfly 

 from Highlands, near Graharastown ; and in 1870 I had the pleasure, with 

 her, of observing it in some numbers at a spot a few miles from Highlands. 

 On the Bashee River Colonel Bowker noted Jahlusa as rare, and keeping 

 constantly to particular trees, whence it would chase away other butterflies. 

 Both at Uitenhage and at Zwaartwater's Poort I found that Jahlusa delighted 

 to settle on the stems and twigs of the " Spekboom " (Porttdacaria afra), but 

 did not avoid those of other trees, and sometimes visited twigs of mere bushes. 

 At the latter locality they also continually settled on a low, rough-leaved 

 Solatium with dull-purple flowers, sucking at an exudation on its stems and 

 (in one instance) at its flowers.^ When thus engaged they were well hidden, 

 the leaves of the Solanum being broad and lying horizontally towards the 

 summit of the plant ; and when settled on tlie white bark of tlie trees (espe- 

 cially on the glossy-white of the Spekboom), their silvery under side rendered 

 them very inconspicuous. On the wing the species most resembles Atella 

 Phalantha. Its flight, even in the case of the $ , is very slow for a Charaxes, and 

 more like that of Pyrameis Cardui. It was in February that I made these obser- 



^ As will be seen elsev/here, the Marquis Antinori in Abyssinia noted the same habit in 

 Ch. Candiope (Godt.) 



