DISTRIBUTION OF THE GENUS MEGAPODIUS IN PACIFIC. 749 



a Papilio mimicking them obtains no protection in the vicinity of 

 these birds. 



5. There is no bird in Ceylon known to eat butterflies that dis- 

 tinctly discriminates as an adult between one species of butterfly 

 and another. 



6. It has been shown that there is a great destruction of 

 butterfly life in the dry zone, and that here, if anywhere, Miillerian 

 or Batesian mimicry might be induced, but the destroyers are 

 largely migi'atory and their attacks are not selective. 



7. That the number of broods of butterflies which occur be- 

 tween the termination of tasting experiments in one year and the 

 commencement of them in the next is so great that any influence 

 which could be wrought by such is almost inappreciable. 



8. The little evidence available shows that young Ceylon birds 

 imitate their parents in their choice of food ; but as regards butter- 

 flies, the fact that there is no discrimination shown by adults leads 

 one to conclude either that few or no tasting experiments were 

 undertaken in youth, or, what is more probable, that their taste 

 with I'egard to them is indifferent. 



9. It is questionable, and so far as an accurate knowledge of one 

 species goes it is definitely shown, that that form of mimicry re- 

 presented by wet and dry season forms (cryptic defence) is not 

 produced for the protection" of the species, inasmuch as many 

 (four) succeeding broods of the wet weather form may be found 

 under dry season conditions without detriment to the species. 



34. The Distribution o£ the Avian Genus Megapodms in the 

 Pacific Islands. By J. J. Lister, M.A., F.R.S., F.L.S., 

 F.Z.S. 



[Received and Read May 9, 1911.] 



(Text-figure 166.) 



The Megapodiidse or Mound Builders are, as is well known, 

 large birds, with comparatively feeble powers of flight, con- 

 stituting a family of the order Gallinte. They are distributed over 

 the islands of the East Indian Ar-chipelago and Western Pacific, 

 from the Philippines and Borneo to the New Hebrides, and are 

 found in several parts of the continent of Australia, Four out- 

 lying species of the genus Megapodms are found in the Nicobar, 

 the Pelew, and the Marianne Islands, and, far out in the Pacific, 

 on the little island of Niuafou, belonging to the Tongan group. 



As we cannot suppose that the birds found in these outlying 

 islands, remote from the other species, can have flown across the 

 intervening tracts of ocean, we are presented with the problem ; 

 How did they reach these islands ? 



The solution to which M. Oustalet gives his adhesion, in his 

 Proc. Zool. Soc— 1911, No. LII. 52 



