736 LT.-COL. ^'. MANDERS ON THE 



5 one, under the cherry-tree, having amputated both wings on 

 one side close to the body. The cock bird flew down ahuost 

 immediately and seized D. fumata, and as usual it had great 

 difficulty with the wings ; about ten minutes afterwai'ds it took 

 the A.hyjjerbius, but T. hecabe was left. I fancy the wings rather 

 "put off" the bird. 



29.4.09. The birds have a nest with young in a cherry-tree 

 in the grounds. I put down ^i. hyperhius $ , T. hecabe, iVeptis 

 leucothoe, and one or two others ; they had all been dead some 

 days and were very dry. After some time the bird noticed them, 

 flew down and seized the Argynnis, which had its wings closed 

 and showing the underside. It flew with it into a tree but very 

 shortly dropped it, it was evidently too dry. I found it had been 

 caught by the fore wings, one of which was gone with also a 

 portion of one hind wing. The same afternoon put down live 

 Pyrameis cardui, N. leucothoe, T. hecabe, Applas nadina, and 

 Euploea core, but with both wings on one side removed. The cock 

 bird flew down among them and caused a great flutter ; it first 

 caught the Terias, then the Neptis, and lastly the Eiqdoea, which 

 provided a great chase. It carried them altogether to the nest, 

 but in feeding the young, the Euploea escaped ; the bird was after 

 it in a flash, caught it again and canied it back to the nest. It 

 was very intei-esting to watch its effoi'ts to get such a lai^ge insect, 

 the size of our Camberwell Beauty, into the young one's mouth. 

 Three or four times it had to take it out and manipulate it in its 

 own beak before another trial ; eventually, it succeeded in forcing 

 it down the youngster's gullet. 



2.5.09. A half- winged live A. hyperbms placed near the nest. 

 I am sure the bird noticed it, but beyond regarding it carefully 

 it did not molest it. 



I am convinced from long and repeated observation that the 

 old birds never fed on butterflies themselves or fed their young 

 with them. A critic, whose opinion I value highly, has objected 

 that because I never saw one of these bii'ds capture a butterfly, 

 it is no proof that they did not do so and that very possibly 

 the difiiculty of catching them would only induce pui-suit 

 when the butterfly was off its guard and a capture possible. 

 I do not know why the birds should be more coy of capturing 

 a butterfly than a house-fly in my presence, and I can scarcely 

 believe they took the oi:)portunity of my absence to do so. 

 Granted that difficulty of captui-e was the reason foi' non- 

 pursuit, what chance, it may be asked, would a young bird with 

 considerably feebler power of flight have of conducting a series 

 of tasting expei"iments on these butterflies ? It is not infrequent 

 in the writings of advocates of mimicry to explain the rareness 

 of attack by difficulty of capture ; but by doing so they seemingly 

 forget that if such is the case with old birds, it makes tasting- 

 experiments (with butterflies) very difficult for young ones. 



