1886.] MR. H.J. ELWES ON THE GENUS PARNASSIUS. 43 
some degree analogous to that of P. tenedius, is utterly unlike that 
of any known Parnassius. It is very curious that though M. Ober- 
thiir has received many examples of the female, he has as yet no 
male, as it will be most interesting to examine the clasping organs, in 
order to see whether they differ from those of P. charltonius, which 
I have figured, in as marked a manner as the female appendage 
does; M. Oberthiir, who figures this organ well, says that he has 
two virgin females in which it is not developed. 
There is some variation in the number of the large blue ocelli on 
the hind wing of this grand insect ; normally they are two in num- 
ber, but one specimen figured by M. Oberthiir has two additional small 
ones above, which gives it even a stronger resemblance to P. charl- 
tonius, in which five is the usual number. The antenne are black, the 
fringes of the fore wings black, edged with white, and of the hind 
wings plain white. 
This grand species was discovered by the French missionary 
bishop of Tibet, M. Félix Biet, at Ta-tsien-lo, a town near the 
frontiers of China and Tibet, at about 7500 feet elevation, where 
it flies all the summer, and may probably extend throughout that 
very inaccessible tract of mountains which have yielded so many 
zoological and botanical treasures to the researches of Abbé David, 
and from whence so many new butterflies have recently been 
described by M. Charles Oberthiir. 
P. CHARLTONIUS. 
Parnassius charltonius, Gray, Cat. Lep. Brit. Mus. p. 77, t. xii. 
fig. 7, ¢ (1852); Moore, Yarkand Mission, Lep. p. 5, t. 1. 
fig. 3, 2. 
This splendid species must be considered, with P. imperator, as the 
grandest of the whole genus. The superficial resemblance which it 
bears to P. imperator first led me to study the question of the pouches 
in this genus, which have been so much neglected, and which in this 
species is so remarkable. 
First discovered by Major Charlton at Lapsang, in his journey in 
Ladak, so memorable in the history of the genus, and figured by Gray, 
along with P. acco, simo, jacquemonti, and hardwickei, P. charitonius 
remains one of the rarest and least known of the genus. Dr. Sto- 
liczka found it again at Kharbu, 13,000 feet, in the same province, 
and the same naturalist during the Yarkand expedition obtained a 
female. 
M. Lionel de Nicéville and Capt. Young have both found it at 
Koksir, below the Baralacha pass, in the province of Lahoul, from 
12,000 to 14,000 feet elevation, where in some seasons it is not 
uncommon from the middle of July to the middle of August, when 
the females are still fresh. 
Having had the whole of the specimens collected by these gen- 
tlemen under comparison, I find that, in this locality at least, they 
vary less than most species. None have any red in the usual spots 
on the fore wing, but on the hind wing is a small red ocellus ringed 
with black, and sometimes nearly obsolete, near the costa; a large 
