COMMON BUTTERFLIES OF THE PLAINS. 103 



an even, continual np-ancl-down motion of the wings above the 

 horizontal ; the females are not so often seen as the males but may 

 be found sitting oftener than the males, generally on a leaf, above or 

 below, always with the wings together over the back, the forewings 

 hardly at all drawn into the hinder ones. The insects do not seem 

 to go much to flowers and are never found at water. The females 

 may be caught when fluttering about in the underwood laying eggs ; 

 the males must be taken in their flight ; and it is not always an easy 

 thing to get them, for they are good at dodging and have plentj^ of 

 trees to facilitate their escape. 



The female of this butterfly is not quite such a strong, active 

 insect as the male or, at least, is never found flying in the same 

 way , she is generally seen fluttering around in the underwood. She 

 is rather like a Banais aglea at first sight, the wings being marked 

 in a similar manner, though of course they are rather different in 

 shape ; the green eyes, however, at once give her away. These fade 

 after life is extinct, in a very few days becoming a reddish brown. 



The food-plant of the larva is Gapparis heyneana, the same as that 

 of hipjpia ; it is a thorny, scandent bush generally found in the ever- 

 green-forest regions of the Western Ghats in the Bombay Presi- 

 dency. It is a common species. 



P. pingasa is found in Kanara, the JSTilgiris, Mysore, Malabar, 

 Cochin, Travancore and the South Andaman Islands. The other 

 species, P. ceylanica, inhabiting Ceylon is supposed to be distin- 

 guished from it by having the " terminal black border not of even 

 width throughout, distinctly narrowed posteriorly." The Kanara 

 specimens do not all absolutely tally with the description given for 

 pingasa or that of ceylanica. 



(To he continued.^ 



