NYMPHALINM. (Group NrUPaALINA.) 71 



a purplish colour, variegated by lines of a dull creamy-white ; slight angular 

 projections along abdomen " (Dr. Forsayeth, I.e.). 



Habitat. — India ; Ceylon ; Burma ; China ; Hong Kong ; Formosa. 



Distribution, Habits, etc. — " This is a common species and appears to occur 

 everywhere in India up to about 6000 feet elevation. It is exceedingly variable on 

 the underside, specimens from the dry north-west being of a pale stone-grey, while 

 examples from Shillong, Assam, have the underside dark brown, richly mottled and 

 shaded with paler brown. On the upperside, too, there are variations in markings, 

 some males show traces of two ochreous bands across the cell of the forewing, which 

 are usually more or less present in the female, in some specimens of the latter sex 

 that feature being very prominent. The ocelli vary greatly in size in both sexes, in 

 some specimens they are fully twice as large as in others. The specimens from 

 Upper Burma, Cachar, and Assam are richly marked on the underside, and are 

 almost identical with the typical J. Onfhya from China, which Mr. Butler has already 

 shown (Ann. N. H. 1885, 308) to extend to Siam. The Western form with the pale, 

 slightly marked underside, has been separated as a distinct local race as /. Swinhoei 

 (Butler, I.e.). This variety is fairly constant throughout the dry tracts in the West 

 and North-west, and also in the Western Himalayas, but there is no line of demar- 

 cation, and the two forms gradually merge into each other. Specimens from Ceylon 

 and Travancore are nearly as richly marked as those from Cachar ; those from 

 Sikkim and Bhotan, and also from the Western Ghats are less richly marked ; 

 and those from the plains of Bengal and the Coromandel coast still less so ; the 

 differences as in all parallel cases following the tropical distribution of the rainfall, 

 the colours being most intense where the rainfall is heaviest" (de Niceville, Butt. 

 Ind. ii. 74). " Found in Kumaon, both in the plains and up to 6000 feet elevation " 

 (W. Doherty, J. A, S. Bengal, 1886, 123). " Generally seen in company with 

 J. Eierta ; it also closely resembles it in habits and time of appearance. Both are 

 to be met with on the wing in the Hills from March to November " (L. de Niceville, 

 Indian Agriculturist, January, 1880). "Partial to bare grass land; to be seen in 

 the hottest hot winds, and in the bleak wiutery weather, pitched on the grass, 

 flitting quickly away and pitching again after a short circuit. Larva reared on 

 Anfirrhinum" (Captain A. M. Lang, Notes). Colonel C. Swinhoe records its 

 capture at " Quetta, Beluchistan, in September" (Tr. Ent. Soc. 1885, 339). Colonel 

 J. W. Yerbury took it at " Campbellpore, forty miles from Rawul Pindi, in April, at 

 Attock in April, and at Bugnoter in September. It is probably the commonest 

 butterfly all the year round both at Campbellpore and Murree, but at Thuudiani 

 Hill Station, 8700 feet elevation, it is uncommon" (Ann. N. H. 1888, 142). " Com- 

 monly found in ditches all the year round in Bombay and the Deccan. I have taken 

 it at Karachi in May" (Colonel C. Swinhoe, P. Z. S. 1885, 128). Dr. Forsayeth 



