1889.] 269 



With reference to your note on Vanessa sounds, I thought it 

 might interest you to know that I have noticed that both Vanessa Io 

 and V, urticce produce the same sound by the friction of the costa of 

 the hind-wing on the upper wing. I noticed it in both species when 

 I was making drawings of them. As soon as their wings had become 

 dry after emerging from the pupse, upon any slight disturbance they 

 suddenly spread their wings and thus produced the sound. I have 

 little doubt but that the other Vanessidce make the same sounds. — 

 F. W\ Fbohawk. 



9, Dornton Eoad, Balham, S.W. : 

 March Uh, 1889. 



Last year I bred some two dozen Vanessa polychloros, and the 

 sound you describe was most distinct, but I took no particular notice 

 at the time, concluding it was caused solely by the motion of the wings 

 rubbing either one against the other at the base, or more likely by 

 that part of the hind-wing which forms a reception for the abdomen, 

 the texture of which (if I may use the term) is of a tougher nature 

 than the rest of the wing, and is peculiarly so in this species. I 

 should liken the sound in a faint way to the rustling of silk. — 

 N. P. Fenwick. 



Holmwood, Surbiton Hill : 



February 2Sth, 1889. 



Until I read your article on the sounds produced by Vanessa, I 

 supposed that the fact of a sound being produced by the species of 

 this genus was well known. Only this winter a Vanessa Io was 

 brought to me, and I let it loose in my conservatory. It was, however, 

 sluggish, and I could not get it to fly about as I desired ; I therefore 

 kept touching it with a pencil, each time it opened and shut its wings 

 and produced the usual sound. So far as I could judge (examining 

 it closely) the sound is produced (in the act of opening the wings) by 

 the rubbing of the costal and subcostal veins of the hind-wings over 

 the median and submedian veins of the fore-wings ; the sound can be 

 produced by doubling a piece of writing paper and rubbing the two 

 sides of it together between the finger and thumb — it is neither 

 grating nor squeaking. — A. Gr. Butler. 



British Museum (Natural History), 



Cromwell Road, London, S.W. : 

 February 28th, 1889. 



