104 LEPIDOPTERA INDICA. 



speckled costal stripe beyond the cell, and a black patch crossed by a -white bar at 

 end of the cell. Hindwing beautifully marked with rich dark reddish-brown trans- 

 verse sinuous fascije with pale ochreous borders, which are numerously speckled 

 with greyish-white and black scales ; the veins from the base also lined with 

 greyish-white ; two white-edged blackish marks within the cell and a larger similar 

 mark beyond the cell ; outer disc traversed by a series of cordiform ocellate reddish 

 spots with blue and black-speckled centres, followed by a submai-ginal blue-speckled 

 blackish lunular line and a narrower similar marginal line. Body above olivescent 

 golden-brown; palpi above blackish, beneath pale ochreous, the sides being 

 white ; legs pale ochreous, femora beneath black-speckled with white ; antennae 

 black above, beneath and tip reddish-ochreous. 



Expanse 2 to 3 inches. 



Lae\'A. — Head black, minutely tuberculated. Segments slightly hairy, armed 

 with a dorsal and three lateral rows of branched-spiues ; spines mostly black ; 

 segments blackish, numerously covered with very small yellowish spots. (Described 

 from preserved specimens in Coll. Hocking.) 



Habitat. — W. and E. Himalayas; Assam; Naga Hills; Burma; Bombay; 

 Nilgiris ; Ceylon ; China ; Japan. 



DiSTKiBUTiON, ETC. — " This is a common species wherever the food plant, the 



nettle, is found. It occurs commonly in the Himalayas up to considerable elevations. 



I possess a curious aberration, taken in the Deyra Dun, in July, by Col. Buckley, 



which almost exactly agrees with a variety of the European species (AtaJanta) 



figured by Herbst (pi. ISO, fig. 5, 6) " (de Niceville, Butt. Ind. ii. 229). "It is 



very common in the late summer and autumn months throughout the N. "W. 



Himalayas, and hybernated specimens are met with in the spring " (id. Indian 



Agriculturist, Jan., 1880). Col. J. W. Yerbury found it " common at Thundiani, 



the Hill Station above Abbottabad, in May, August, and September " (Ann. N. H. 



1888, 139), Capt. A. M. Lang found it "abundant in the W. Himalayas from 5000 



to 10,000 feet elevation. Larvae taken at Kasauli on nettle, in June and July " 



(MS. Notes), Mr, P, W. Mackinnon says it is " more common in Masuri than 



Cardui, but is comparatively rare in the Dun, The larvae feed on different species 



of Urticacese, and is gregarious. It flies almost throughout the year " (J. Bombay 



N. H. Soc, 1897, 375). Major J. L. Sherwill, in his Journal of a trip in November 



in the Sikkim Himalayas, says this butterfly " was common at great elevations. I 



observed it on the snow, and on the glaciers at 13,000 feet to 16,000 feet elevation, 



but it was the sole inhabitant of these cold and dreary regions " (J. A. S. Bengal, 



1882, 479). " Not uncommon in Sikkim, in open ground, at all seasons and 



elevations up to 12,000 feet elevation " (H. J. Elwes, Tr. Ent, Soc, 1888, 362). 



Col. C. Swinhoe records taking " several examples in Bombay in 1877 " (P. Z. S. 



