MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 335 



No. VIII,- NOTE ON LEHERA ERYX, LINN^US, 

 A LYC^NID BUTTEEFLY. 



The larva of LeJiera eryx, Linnteus, is curiously similar to that of Virachola 

 perse, Hewitson, with which I found it ; its habits are also identical. The 

 only differences noted were as follows : — 



Whereas in F. »erse the medial segments were a deep red-brown, and the 

 three anterior and three posterior segments ochreous, the medial ones in 

 L. eryx were more purplish in tint (inclining to indigo when undergoing the 

 pupal change), and the anterior segments more orange than ochreous. The 

 last pair of breathing apertures in V. perse were pale buff (the others being 

 tlack), but those of L, eryx were the same colour as the other lateral ones, viz., 

 black with shiny black rims. Both larvse had a quadrate buff patch occupying 

 the central dorsal portion of the two medial segments, but in L. eryx the patch 

 was rather smaller and paler than that of V. perse-, 



On 20th June, 1895, at Fagoo, 2,500 feet, British Bhutan, I found eleven 

 pupas of Lehera eryx, Linnsus, in the interior of the fruit of the wild pome- 

 granate. They were enclosed in precisely the same manner as those of Vira- 

 chola perse, Hewitson, which feeds on the fruit of the same plant. Out of 

 these pupae only one had the opening in the side of the fruit closed with 

 a web, the rest being quite open, and, as the fruit was in all cases in a rotten 

 condition, it was also occupied by small dipterous (fly) larvae, and Coleoptera 

 (beetles), in two or three cases with a very small ant which did not attack 

 the pupae, but I cannot see what use they could be to this insect as they are 

 to other lycsenids. The pupa is robust, reddish-brown mottled with fuscous, 

 especially on the back and sides. In some specimens the first two abdominal 

 segments were dorsally yellowish. The butterflies commenced to emerge 

 within a week after I found the pup^. 



G. C. DUDGEON, f.e.s. 

 Fagoo, Bkitish Bhutan, September, 1895. 



