106 LEPIDOPTEBA INDICA. 



Female. Upperside pale greyish-blue. Forewing darker towards the base, with 

 a few brighter blue scales ; the marginal bands blackish-brown, broader on the costa, 

 l»ut narrower at the apex than it is in the male. Hindwiny generally darker than the 

 forewing, the bands paler, the costal band broader than it is in the male, its lower part 

 <larker than its upper, outer marginal band broader and macular, a rather prominent discal 

 Itand of somewhat lunular marks, evenly curved, but the marks placed in echelon with 

 each other. Underside as in the male, but the discal series on both wings nearly 

 always present. 



Expanse of wings, ^ $ 1^ to I-^q inches. 



Larva, considerably distended anteriorly, excavated at the sides, contracted 

 Ijehind, and transversely swelled at the segments. Feeds on a species of Loranthus, 

 which grows parasitically in great abundance on the mango and other fruit trees 

 surrounding the villages of the natives. (Horsfield.) 



Pupa, purple-brown, short, thick, head truncate, excavated behind the thorax, 

 dorsal segments produced. (Moore.) 



de Niceville remarks : — " As figured in the two Catalogues of the Lepidoptera of the 

 East Indian Company from Dr. Horsfield's drawings, the larva is a singular object ; 

 the head is small but prominent, the segments rapidly increasing in breadth from the 

 second to about the fifth, apparently bearing small blunt conical processes on these 

 segments, coloured rich brown from about the sixth to the anal segment, which 

 gradually decreases in width, the dorsal region pale ochreous, the lateral region greyish, 

 the sides of the middle segments excavated, forming a broad triangular figure, of a 

 rich brown colour, anteriorly bounded by a white line." 



Davidson, Bell and Aitken's description is, however, somewhat different, they are 

 very painstaking observers and made the life history of butterflies a careful study, they 

 say : — " The larva, which feeds on both the common species of Loranthus [L. dasticus 

 and L. wallichianus), has the head flattened, and the next segments enlarged ; the 

 segments then decrease in size to the anal segment which is broad and rectangular at 

 its extremity. Looked at from above, the caterpillar Ls broad at the anal segment, 

 narrow at the next four segments, and very broad at the thoracic segments. In colour 

 it is ereen, but has triano;ular marks of mottled white on each side, and a rounded 

 similar mark above on each segment. The pupa resembles that of T. indra, but the 

 abdominal segments are much more angular than in that species." 



Habitat. — India, Burma, Ceylon, Malay Peninsula, Java, Borneo ; a beautiful and 

 very common species, distributed throughout India except in the desert tracts ; the 

 type is in the Zoological Museum, Copenhagen ; Aurivillius has examined it, and states 

 that undoubtedly the insect we have heretofore called longinus is the Fabrician 

 cippus, and that the type described by Fabricius as longinus is merely a variety of 

 cippus. We give Aurivillius' note in extenso, when describing the species heretofore 



