1888.] LEPIDOrTERA OF CHRISTMAS ISLAND. 543 



though composed of smaller spots than in 11. alcmene ; the secon- 

 daries paler, redder towards the outer border, and with larger white 

 marginal and suhniarginal spots. Expanse of wings 92-99 millim. 



Three males and five females, obtained on the 3rd and 4th October. 

 One of the specimens is labelled as having been taken at an elevation 

 of " 700 feet on yellow creepers of jungle " and another " caught east 

 of Lunch tree, October 4, 1887." 



The perfect constancy of this species interests me, inasmuch as I 

 have recently been accused of making far too many species in this 

 genus : — 



At a meeting of the Entomological Society of London (held Nov. 

 4th, 1885) Mr. Gervase F. Mathew exhibited a number of specimens 

 of this genus of Butterflies from Fiji and other islands of the Western 

 Pacific, and stated that the males varied in no way whatever, but of 

 the females, of which forty-eight were exhibited, scarcely two were 

 alike ; he concluded therefore that several species described as new 

 were referable to a single species, and assured the members present 

 that from one brood he had bred individuals agreeing with varieties 

 from the Gilbert, Ellice, and Marshall Islands, the New Hebrides, 

 New Guinea, Tonga, Samoa, &c. Unfortunately the series exhibited 

 to the meeting consisted of females from various localities, corre- 

 sponding with the forms usually received from those localities, and 

 therefore in no way su[)portiiig Mr. Mathew's statement ; it would 

 have been interesting if the polymorphic brood described by him 

 could have been exhibited, but the series before the m.eeting rather 

 tended to prove the constancy of the various island-forms than the 

 reverse. 



In a paper read before the same Society on the 7th December, 

 1887, and pubhshed in this year's 'Transactions,' Mr. Mathew 

 associates all the local forms under the name of Hypolimnas bolinn ' 

 and observes : — " This butterfly is occasionally to be seen in the 

 vicinity of Sydney, but I never met with it there myself. I have 

 taken it at Brisbane, Cooktown, Claremont Islands, Thursday Island, 

 Fiji, New Caledonia, Friendly Islands, New Hebrides, Itotumah 

 Island, Solomon Islands, Gilbert Islands, Samoa, Pelew Islands, 

 New Guinea, New Britain, and have received it from Norfolk Island." 

 He adds; — "On account of the extraordinary manner in which the 

 females vary, it being extremely difiicult to obtain two exactly alike 

 from the same brood of larvae, a number of new s{)ecies have been 

 described, among which I may mention naresii, mosleyi, pallescens, 

 pulchra, and montrouzieri of Butler, and otaheitcB, Felder." 



At a meeting of the same Society, held on the 4th April of the 

 present year, Mr. Salvin exhibited about sixty specimens, no two of 

 which were alike, of a species of Hypolimnas caught by Mr. Wood- 

 ford near Suva, Viti Levu, Fiji, on one patch of Zinnias. This ex- 

 hibition, though intere;ting, really added nothing to our knowledge 

 of the genus, since the varieties shown were those connecting 

 //. pallescens with an extremely dark representative of H. ant'ujone, 

 which in the Muscuin collection have been associated since the year 



' //. hoUna is an Indian type never yet received from the Australian Region. 



37* 



