EUPLCEINJE. 13 



instinctivelj, regularly and simultaneously, as if animated by a true migratory 

 impulse. They naturally suggest a most interesting inquiry as to whence these 

 immense numbers come and whither they are tending, whether their course is a 

 straight-ahead one, or is following a horizontal circular direction of greater or lesser 

 diameter. These insects when thus moving in company show an unwillingness to 

 be diverted from their course, and when attracted by a favourite plant in flower, it 

 is only for a few minutes that they remain upon it, and after regaling themselves, 

 soon start off to resume their journey with their fellow-travellers, moving again 

 amongst them as before and bound for the same destination. It is curious to observe 

 that butterflies of a totally different kind, when they happen to come within the 

 range of one of these moving columns, are for a period carried away apjDarently by 

 the same impulse and fly in company with it, but are soon seen to be moving off 

 independently as at first. Reverting to the Euploeas, these insects when stopping 

 for a short time to refresh themselves upon an attractive flower, are with little 

 difficulty captured by the hand, and then simulate death for a few seconds, soon 

 flying away. They are so tenacious of life as to be able to bear considerable 

 pressure between the finger and thumb without being killed ; they exsert at the time 

 a peculiar long silky anal appendage of a bright yellow colour, which is almost 

 immediately retracted into its sheath. Birds and other insectivorous animals do not 

 appear to be partial to these butterflies as food ; they are probably unpalatable to 

 them owing to their possessing a peculiar odour. The larvae I have most frequently 

 found feeding upon leaves of the species of Ficus and Dogbane. The suspended 

 cbrysalids are brilliantly metallic in colouring." Mr. De Niceville (Butt. Ind. i. 22) 

 also writes that " Capt. C. H. E. Adamson on one occasion nearMoidraein, on the 12th 

 June, found hundreds of J/wpZcece of numerous species, all congregated round a single 

 flowering tree in the jungle, at a time when scarcely a single Euplcea was to be found 

 elsewhere in the neighbourhood. Mr. H. Fergusson has observed much the same 

 habit in Hestia [^malaharica], and every one who has paid attention to the subject 

 must have observed the swarms of the common Danais chrijsippus, B. Qemdia, and 

 Euplcea Gore to be found from time to time in various localities." 



The flight of these butterflies, according to Mr. Scudder (Z. c. 703) is powerful 

 and sustained, although generally rather slow. They often sail high in the air on 

 expanded wing. The species are exceptionally numerous in individuals, and some 

 are known to migrate. 



Vaeious Mimicks of the EuPLCEiNiE. — " Limnas chrysippus, like all the Euploeinfe 

 group, is a butterfly that no bird or lizard will touch. It is an insect common all 

 over India, Burma, and Ceylon, the Philippines, Turkey, Madagascar, Arabia, the 

 W.S. and S.B. coast of Africa, and in all these places (Pin Turkey) the protected 

 females of Hypollmnas misippiis are also to be found. In Aden and in several parts 



