1882.] MR. H.J. ELWES ON BUTTERFLIES FROM SIKKIM. 403 
soni, Moore, and resembles the former very closely above, but not 
below. The males have a more purple tinge on both wings than 
T hewitsoni, but the females are hardly, if at all, to be distinguished 
from this species, which I have taken at Darjeeling in December. 
The genus is a very difficult one, as there are four or five very nearly 
allied species in the Himalaya. 
VANESSA LADAKENSIS, Moore, Yarkand Mission, Lep. p. 3, t. i. 
fig. 2 (1879). 
About fifteen specimens, mostly worn, of this species, all of which 
agree in their characters, and can be known at once from the forms of 
V. urtice by the shape of the fore wings, which are rounded at the 
apex, with hardly a trace of the projecting point below the angle which 
is conspicuous in V. urtice, V. kashmeriensis, and V. polychloros. It 
seems to be an inhabitant of the high cold plateau of Tibet, was first 
taken at Gogra in Ladak, and has never been sent to England from 
Sikkim, to my knowledge, before ; so I think we may conclude that 
it does not occur on this side of the passes. 
VANESSA KASHMERIENSIS, Koll. Kasch. p. 442, t. ii. 
Some of the specimens of this species are very near V. rizana of 
Moore, which seems to me hardly separable from it. 
Sikkim specimens, as a rule, are darker than those from Kashmir. 
It occurs at and below Darjeeling during winter, and I have taken 
it on sunny December days at 4000 feet. 
VANESSA C-ALBUM, Linn. 
A single, rather worn specimen was included in the collection, 
which, until we know more of the Himalayan varieties, I prefer to 
eall V. c-album. It is certainly much nearer to Amur specimens of 
V..c-album than to what I have from Mr. Moore as typical V. agnicula. 
I have only seen one specimen from Sikkim before, which differed 
from this one; and four others which I possess from various parts of 
the Himalaya differ from each other as much as a similar number 
ot European specimens from various localities do. Unfortunately, 
I have but fifty specimens in all of this group—not a tithe of what 
would be required to illustrate it properly ; but the more I see, the 
more impossible it seems to define them clearly. I should be much 
obliged to any entomologist for the loan of local series showing the 
amount of variation in different localities ; but, so far as I can see at 
present, no one can say to what species a given specimen of any of 
there forms belongs, unless he was told where it came from; and if 
that be so, what more is necessary to prove my theory ? 
ARGYNNIS ALTISSIMA, n. sp. (Plate XXYV. fig. 8.) 
Of this species I received ten specimens, all of which, as well as 
I can judge in the somewhat crushed state of their bodies, are males. 
Nine of them agree very well in size and pattern; but the tenth 
is at least a quarter larger in size, and has the wings broader and less 
pointed. In fact it has the appearance of a less alpine variety than 
