348 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
Sir Sidney Saunders communicated some notes from M. Jules 
Lichtenstein, of Montpellier, describing the metamorphoses of the blister- 
beetle, which, after repeated failures for many years, he had recently 
succeeded in rearing from the egg. 
Mr. Meldola communicated a translation of a paper by Dr. Fritz 
Miller, published in ‘ Kosmos,’ May, 1879, and entitled ‘“ Jtuna and 
Thyridia ; a remarkable case of Mimicry in Butterflies.” 
With reference to Dr. Fritz Miiller’s remarks on the inexperience of 
young birds, Mr. Jenner Weir stated that from the numerous experiments 
which he had made on the subject of larve which are eaten or rejected, he 
had always been profoundly impressed with the utter disregard paid by birds 
to larve which were inedible. He had never but once seen a distasteful 
larva even examined by a bird. When, day by day, he had thrown into his 
aviary various larve, those which were edible were eaten immediately ; 
those which were inedible were no more noticed than if a pebble had been 
thrown before the birds. It was Mr. Weir's opinion that the experience of 
birds in this respect had become hereditary in the species, and was not the 
result of the experience of individual birds, but was rather to be regarded 
as an act of “ unconscious cerebration.” 
Mr. Bates, whilst acknowledging the great value of the numerous facts 
adduced from his own personal observation by Dr. Fritz Miiller, could not 
agree with him in his proposal to separate, as a distinct family, Ituna and 
Lycorea (with Danais) from Thyridia and the remainder of the Ithomia 
group; the characters mentioned by him only went to prove that tuna 
and Lycorea were the connecting links between Danais and the Ithomie, 
thus justifying the views of those Lepidopterists who first defined 
this important group nearly twenty years ago. With regard to the still 
incompletely solved problem of mimicry, he could not see that Dr. Miller's 
explanations and calculations cleared up all the difficulties. The numerous 
cases where species which are themselves apparently protected by their 
offensive secretions evidently mimic other species similarly protected still 
form a great stumbling-block. ‘The excessive complexity of the question 
must be evident to all who read Dr. Fritz Miiller’s writings on this subject. 
The phenomena with regard to the Heliconide, stated broadly, were 
these :—In Tropical South America a numerous series of gaily-coloured 
butterflies and moths, of very different families, which occur in abundance 
in almost every locality a naturalist may visit, are found all to change their 
hues and markings together, as if by the touch of an enchanter’s wand, at 
every few hundred miles, the distances being shorter near the eastern 
slopes of the Andes than nearer the Atlantic. So close is the accord of 
some half dozen species (of widely different genera) in each change that 
he (Mr. Bates) had seen them in large collections classed and named 
respectively as one species. Such a phenomenon was calculated to excite 
