1886.] MR. H.J. ELWES ON THE GENUS PARNASSIUS. 25 
Montana, by Mr. Courtis, is so interesting that I copy it from 
* Papilio,’ vol. in. p. 158. 
Mr. W. H. Edwards is here speaking of P. smintheus, var. 
hermodur, H. Edw., and says :—‘ These Montana examples of both 
sexes are very large, considerably beyond the average of smintheus 
from Colorado, some males and females reaching 2°70 inches. 
Several of the females are very black, there being little of the yellow- 
white ground left, and that principally in cells of primaries and on 
disks of secondaries. ‘The red spots are of extraordinary size. I 
should have taken the female for a distinct species had not the male 
been so like and often indistinguishable from the Colorado males of 
smintheus, though larger. Some of them have the spots orange as 
in var. behrit. 
* Several of both sexes I cannot distinguish from a pair of P. inter- 
medius sené me by Dr. Staudinger as Ménétries’ species from Siberia. 
These are the examples which are not melanic, and in which the 
marginal borders of both wings are transparent. I have a female 
of the same form taken on Mt. Bradley, California, by Mr. James 
Behrens’. 
«Mr. Courtis at my suggestion shut up some females with Sedum, 
on which smintheus has been known to lay, and obtained 140 eggs. 
Mr. Courtis says, ‘Most of these eggs came from females that mated 
after I caught them. ‘Tbe others would not lay, although I kept 
them shut up with several males until they nearly starved,’ ” 
This is a most curious fact, as 1 found that P. mnemosyne, and 
Mr. Thompson found that P. apollo, mated freely in captivity ; but 
Mr. Edwards says this is the first instance he has heard of in which 
butterflies have mated in captivity. 
‘*Mr. Courtis goes on to say:—‘ The virgin females seemed to have 
the end of abdomen a light green horn instead of black, but after 
mating I noticed they turned black.’ This seems to throw doubt 
on either Mr. Courtis’s accuracy of observation, or to prove that the 
development of the pouch is not as inP. apollo. He goes on to say :— 
‘I think they lay on the roots of plants, as the females always drop 
to the ground, climb up astalk, and fly away. Those in confinement 
climbed sticks and window frames, laying eggs as they went. They 
curved their bodies round and put an egg on whatever they touched, 
except the Sedum ; I made one lay on it by keeping her moving from 
one piece to another, but she seemed much excited, and as soon as I 
put her on grass and sticks she laid every few minutes.’ In a later 
letter, 5th of August, Mr. Courtis writes, ‘I noticed a female 
Parnassius alight on a piece of Sedum, drop to the ground, climb up 
and lay an egg either on the leaves or roots or on the ground. I 
could not find the egg, though I saw her go through the motion of 
laying.’” 
Mr. W. H. Edwards has tried without success to breed P. 
1 J have received a pair from this locality, through the kindness of Mr. H. 
Edwards, and can only say of the female that I can hardly distinguish it from 
small examples of discobolus from Turkestan. The difference between the two 
sexes 1s ost marked, the male being very like those from the Altai Mountains. 
