540 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL AISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XIU, 
quite ready for laying, and I have no doubt that it would have been laid 
to-day in the same plain I was searching in had the bird lived. 
I regret to say the egg was broken badly, first pierced by shot and again 
broken in extraction, I have kept the remains of the shell, and should this 
prove to be unique I should be pleased to send it for identification, I 
hope in a few days to have collected a few more eggs of this bird, and am 
sending a man out to the same place, but asitis some twelve miles from 
here I should not go again myself unless absolutely necessary as the weather 
is too hot. 
I should be much obliged if you would let me know what former records 
there are, if any, of Pterocles alchatus breeding in this part of India, and 
whether you consider the above sufficient proof of its doing so. 
J.S. BOGLE, 
Marpan, Ponsas, 10th June, 1900. Q. O. Corps of Guides, 
No. XVI—BUTTERFLIES AS WEATHER PROPHETS, 
I daresay some of you have already heard of the remarkable intimation 
of the approach of that timely rain which saved this Presidency three months 
ago, which was given by one of our commonest butterflies, Huplea core ; 
but it has been suggested to me that so curious a phenomenon ought to find 
a place in our proceedings, so I have drawn up a short note of the facts, 
The migration of Euplea core northwards at the beginning of the monsoon 
has been noticed in our Journal several times, It is a languid, slow-flying 
butterfly which is found throughout India and appears at all seasons. For 
one day each year in the beginning of June the whole community is seized 
with an impulse to go north, and from morning till night they may be seen 
passing, in hundreds or thousands, slowly and irresolutely, but all in one 
direction, Sometimes this movement continues for two days, and among the 
hosts of Euplea core may be seen a few travellers of two allied species, 
Danais aglea and D, limniace. Ihave been told by an observant native that 
this phenomenon takes place three days before the monsoon bursts, I have 
not found this to be invariably the case, but there can be no reasonable 
doubt that the object of the northward movement is to escape from the 
coming rain, It is very observable in the Canara district, where the rainfall, 
as you know, is much heavier than it is further north, For the last ten 
years I have kept notes of the dates on which I observed the migration, and 
I find that it ranges from the first to about the tenth of June, and is always 
closely connected with the coming of the regular rain. This year I did not 
notice it, and do not think it occurred at the usualtime. As you will remem- 
ber, the season was a very peculiar one, There were no storms in May, nor 
even distant thunder and lightning. Our first shower was on the 8th of June, 
