753 



NOTES ON SOME BUTTERFLIES PROM THE 



INDIAN REGION. 



By 



G. W. V. DeRhe-Philipe, f.e.s. 



The following notes are the result of observations made and 

 notes jotted down during the last two years, in the course of which 

 I have done a good deal of personal collecting in the Sikkim and 

 Bhutan Terais, the Khasi and Naga Hills and Assam generally. 

 I have recently had an opportunity of putting these into form and 

 of comparing my specimens with those in the Indian Museum and 

 de Niceville collections ; and have confirmed, as far as possible, the 

 observations I had previously made. The results may be of inter- 

 est to the entomological members of the Society. 



Danais aglea. Cramer. 



Danais melanoides. Moore. 



These two are usually considered as distinct species, or, at any rate, as 

 well differentiated races ; but my experience has been that none of the 

 distinguishing characteristics are constant. I have taken the species 

 in the Western Ghats, Kumaon, the Sikkim and Bhutan Terais, the 

 Naga Hills and the Chittagong Hill Tracts ; and have very carefully 

 examined a long series consisting of specimens from each of these locali- 

 ties. Though extremes can be named readily enough, there are numbers of 

 intermediate forms which it would be impossible, were the locality labels 

 removed, to place either as aglea or melanoides. My own opinion is that all 

 represent one somewhat inconstant species, aglea. 



Another characteristic, which has been used to separate aglea and its 

 allies from the rest of the genus — the anastomosis of vein 11 with vein 12 — 

 is also not constant. The extent of anastomosis varies very considerably. 

 In some cases, a large proportion of vein 11 is anastomosed ; in others, the 

 two veins just touch and separate again : while frequently they only 

 approach each other and do not actually touch. Speaking generally, the 

 anastomosis is greatest in the extreme aglea form from Western India ; and 

 least, if at all existing, in the melanoides form from Assam. 



D. agleaides. Felder, from Burma and the Malayan region, has been 

 separated from aglea mainly on the absence of anastomosis, which, as has 

 been pointed out, fails as a satisfactory test. I have only a small series of 

 this last form ; but it seems to be constant in respect of the great reduc- 

 tion of the hyaline markings on both wings, and is thus a distinct local 

 race. 



I have, in my collection, a curiously aberrant male of the melanoides 



