chap, vni.] A STRANGE FAMILY. 203 



us suppose a roaming Englishman in some remote island 

 to have two wives — one a black-haired red-skinned 

 Indian, the other a woolly-headed sooty- skinned negress ; 

 and that instead of the children being mulattoes of brown 

 or dusky tints, mingling the characteristics of each parent 

 in varying degrees, all the boys should be as fair-skinned 

 and blue-eyed as their father, while the girls should 

 altogether resemble their mothers. This would be thought 

 strange enough, but the case of these butterflies is yet 

 more extraordinary, for each mother is capable not only of 

 producing male offspring like the father, and female like 

 herself, but also other females like her fellow wife, and 

 altogether, differing from herself ! 



The other species to which I have to direct attention is 

 the Kallima paralekta, a butterfly of the same family 

 group as our Purple Emperor, and of about the same size 

 or larger. Its upper surface is of a rich purple, variously 

 tinged with ash colour, and across the fore wings there is 

 a broad bar of deep orange, so that when on the wing it is 

 very conspicuous. This species was not uncommon in dry 

 woods and thickets, and I often endeavoured to capture it 

 without success, for after flying a short distance it would 

 enter a bush among dry or dead leaves, and however care- 

 fully I crept up to the spot I could never discover it till 

 it would suddenly start out again and then disappear in a 

 similar place. At length I was fortunate enough to see 



