708 LT.-COL. N. MANDERS ON THE 



insect by the fore wing — when it saw me it lun to a tree, and I 

 fancy dropped the insect which, as I could not find it, probably 

 flew away. 



December 4. Saw C. versicolor seize Delias eiccharis on the 

 wing. On this occasion the lizard was in the foliage at the top 

 of a bush, and sprang out and captured the butterfly as it flew 

 past. 



December 6. Eitploea core was eagei'ly seized, held in the 

 mouth for a long time and then eaten. 



December 7. Telchlnia violce was eagerly seized by the body and 

 devoured. 



December 9. Two Danais chri/si^jpits taken one after the other 

 by a green Calotes ophiomachus. It watched the butterfly, seized it 

 by the body, and ate the whole of it after holding it in its mouth 

 for some minutes. 



December 18. Papilio (Menelaides) hector seized as soon as seen, 

 held in the mouth for some time and eaten slowly. The lizard 

 seemed very puzzled at the dryness of its meal as the butterfly 

 had been dead five days, but finally ate it all. 



December 20. C. ophioviachiis ate a male Pajnlio p)olytes. 



December 30. Saw Terias hecahe captured by Ccdotes versicolor. 



During these two months buttei'flies and other insects were very 

 nvimerous owing to the rain at the break of the N.E. monsoon. 

 The tall Mauritius grass in the garden was a place, of i-efuge for 

 the butterflies during the heavy rain, and numbers of them could 

 be seen any morning sunning themselves and sitting with 

 expanded wings halfway up the grass stems. P. polytes and 

 P. demoleus were particularly numerous and several had pieces 

 taken out of their wings, no doubt by lizards. It was an 

 interesting fact that so long as the butterflies remained perfectly 

 still, they were entirely unnoticed by the lizards, though they 

 might be in close proximity to them. Both these butterflies 

 rest throughout the night with wings widely expanded. 



Experiments loith Lizards in Nivwara Eliya, 6,200 ft. 



Three species were experimented on, Calotes nigrilabris, Cophotis 

 zeylanica, and Ceratophora stoddartii. All three are peculiar to 

 Ceylon and confined to the hill-districts. C nigrilabris is about 

 a foot in length including the tail, and is brilliant emerald green 

 with a black bar across the lips. It has the same habits as 

 G. versicolor and C. ophiomacJuts but is much tamei- ; in fact it is 

 not at all difiicult to capture with the hand as it rests on a bush. 



Calotes nigrilabris. 



3.3.09. Ate a Terias hecabe greedily, and another shortly after. 



3.3.09. The same lizard ate another T. hecabe, and another 



made frantic grabs at E. core, dangled as usual at the end of a 



