PIERID^. 121 



in " The Tribes on my Frontier," p. 113, quoted by Mr. Distant (Rhop. Malay, 

 p. 285), observes that " butterflies of some kinds — especially those energetic 

 greenish- white ones of the family surnamed CaUidryas — are sometimes seized with 

 a mania for migrating to the far West. I have stood near one of the parade-grounds 

 at Poona, and watched them, with scarce a pause to rest their wings or sip a flower, 

 from eight or nine o'clock until the afternoon, as far as the eye could reach, the host 

 kept streaming past." 



" It was probably butterflies principally belonging to the Pieridaj," writes Mr. 

 W. L. Distant (Rhop. Malayana, p. 284), " which were observed by Mr. B. L. Arnold 

 in Southern India, on one of his excursions in the dry-season." He relates that he 

 " came upon a quiet nullah meandering through the jungle. The bed by chance, 

 just there, was broad and sandy, and the stream a single thread that seemed every 

 moment in danger of vanishing. But to my astonished eyes the whole place 

 appeared a garden of flowers of a thousand colours, and crowded so close by the 

 water that the sand could scarcely be seen. I looked and looked again, and then 

 stepped down to observe the parterre closer ; but, as I did so, these animated 

 blossoms sprang into the air in a huge cloud, and the truth was plain that they were 

 a countless host of thirsty butterflies, collected from the forest all round to drink 

 at this thread of liquid" (On the Indian Hills, ii. 314 (1881). Mr. G. F. 

 Hampson writes, " the only regular flight of butterflies that I have observed 

 in the Nilgiri District, S. India, is one that takes place at the end of May and 

 beginning of June, and consists principally of Gato])silias and Gatophagas (with some 

 Limnainte and Euploein^e). Its direction is from West to East, and the object may 

 be to avoid the S.-W. Monsoon due on June 15th, and sure to deluge the Western 

 and Northern Slopes for many weeks together, with hardly a break" (Epist. Sept. 

 14th, 1886). Sir J. E. Tcnnent, in his Nat. History of Ceylon, p. 403, says, "at 

 times the extraordinary sight presented itself of flights of these delicate creatures, 

 generally of a white or pale yellow hue, apparently miles in breadth and of such 

 prodigious extension as to occupy hours, and even days, uninterruptedly in their 

 passage — whence coming no one knows, whither going no one can tell. The butter- 

 flies I have seen in these wonderful migrations in Ceylon were mostly Gallidryas 

 Hilaria, G. Alcmeone, and G. Pyranthe, with straggling individuals of the genus 

 Eufloea {E. Gore and E. Prothoe). Their passage took place in April and May 

 generally in a north-easterly direction. A friend of mine travelling from Kandy to 

 Kornesralle drove for nine miles throus:h a cloud of white butterflies which were 

 passing across the road by which he went." Dr. Thwaites, in his Ceylon MS. Notes, 

 writes, " This family of butterflies contains several species which are remarkable, 

 like some of the Buploeinge, for their apparently migratory flights. At certain times 

 of the year immense hosts of these butterflies, mostly of a white colour or nearly 

 VOL. VI. i; 



