132 LEPIDOPTERA INDICA. 



ocelli as in the male, and sometimes the ocelli on both wings are of nearly uniform 

 large size throughout, with large white centres. 

 Expanse, S 2^^^ to 2^^^, ? 2^^, to 2^^ inches. 



Dry-season Brood (Plate 127, figs. 1, e, f, g, h, i, c? ? )• 



Melanitis Varaha, Moore, Catal. Lep. Mus. E. I. Company, i. p. 224 (1857), cJ. Marshall and de 

 Niceville, Butt, of India, etc. i. p. 256 (1883). 



Imago. — Male. Upperside rich dark vinescent olive-brown ; both wings with 

 the exterior margin more or less densely speckled with purpurescent-cinereous 

 scales. Foreivhig with the subapical dusky black spots and costal patch very 

 indistinct, the confluent-spots small, each generally with a prominent white pupil, 

 in some they are quite obsolete. Eindivijig with two, or three, posterior submarginal 

 white dots. Underside with the ground-colour either ashy-brown tinged with olive 

 at the base, or pale purpurescent-cinereous-brown with the base olivescent, pur- 

 purescent-cinereous with the base brown, or various shades of dark pui-plish-brown, 

 ferruginous or reddish-brown with the base or transverse fasciae still more intense, 

 or purplish-red with darker base, or, again, in some it is dusky-ochreous ; all are 

 more or less numerously covered with obscure cinereous strigte and the basal 

 area with darker strigee of the ground colour ; the veins also being speckled ; the 

 ordinary fasciae either ill-defined and narrow, or the discal fascia only being indicated 

 as the outer border of the dark basal area ; in some the fascijB are intervened by 

 pale ochreous strigte, and in some few the fasciffi are blotched with darker strigge ; 

 the submarginal series of ocelloid spots are small, more or less ill-defined and 

 imperfectly developed, being either pale ochreous and brown speckled, or pale 

 ochreous, or iron-grey speckled, or, sometimes they are large and prominent and 

 yellowish or brown speckled and with a darker brown speckled ring, those at the 

 apex of the forewing also being sometimes inwardly-bordered by whitish speckles, 

 and there is, generally, present in most specimens a pale ochreous-white speckled 

 patch at end of the cell on the hindwing. 



Female. Upperside pale olivescent-brown, the outer margins cinereous speckled. 

 J''oremng' more acutely and broader angled below the apex than in male; with the 

 apex ochreous tinged, the subapical dusky black spots more defined, white pupilled, 

 and with a slightly-indicated obscure ochreous upper bar to the costa ; a minute 

 white speck also present close to the apex. Hindwing with the posterior sub- 

 marginal white dots more or less distinct. Underside of various shades of dark 

 ochreous or ferruginous, numerously covered with strigas, with the fasciae indicated, 

 and the submarginal ocelloid spots as in the male. Body beneath, and palpi either 

 cinereous or ochreous ; legs brownish-ochreous ; antennae pale ochreous, with a 

 dusky-brown subterminal band and pale tip. 



