66 DESCRIPTIVE CATALOGUE. 



bearing at the sides short bristles, last joint mostly terminated by a single claw or by an obscure 

 spine; in the female the tarsi are covered with short villi, and the joint has two strongly curved 

 claws, which are concealed by tufts of short hair. The claws andpulvilli of the hind-legs are small. 



* Wings somewhat elongated ; hinder wings entire, regularly rounded and elliptical. 



Subgenus Pithecops. 



1. Pjthecops Hylax. AkB supra saturati fuscce, posticce Jimbrid marginali argented ; foeminae 

 anticcB macula discoided angulari albci ■• subtus canescenti-albcB, strigis duabus arcuatis flavo- 

 Juscis, serie macularum fasciaque marginaii continud nigris ; anticce punctis duobus costalibus, 

 postica guttd apicali saturatdmaximd et inter dum puncto anali obsolefiore nigris. (Expansio 

 alarum, lineae 10 — 14.) 



Plate I, fig. 2 ; 2, a. 

 Hesperia R. Hylax. Fab. Ent. Syst. em. tom. 3. pars. 1. p. 304. No. 152. 

 Polyommatus Hylax. MM. Latreille et Godart, Enc. Meth. Hist. Nat. ix. 701. 



Wings above, in the male, deep blackish brown, the colour being uniformly spread over the whole 

 surface to the border of the hinder wings which is silvery white ; a very delicate gray fringe inter- 

 rupted with brown, bounds the forewings : beneath white with a grayish-silvery gloss inclining 

 to blue, and the scales covering their surface large and rough ; anterior wings, marked near the 

 costa, with two small irregular dots of an intense black ; hinder wings, at the posterior angle with 

 a large regularly circumscribed spot of the same colour; a minute dot is in some individuals 

 obscurely perceptible near their anal angle : somewhat beyond the disk both pair of wings are 

 traversed by a delicate, undulated, interrupted striga of reddish brown, exterior of this by a 

 broader continued fascia of the same colour, undulated at its outer edge ; next follows an in- 

 terrupted series of oblong spots, and finally a regular narrow marginal line of intense black, 

 exterior to which the wings are bounded by a silvery fringe : legs covered with lax villi of 

 silvery-white ; tarsi surrounded by a black ring ; body brown above and white underneath ; 

 eyes uncommonly prominent, and bordered with white ; antennce brown, annulated with white. 

 In the female the wings are somewhat broader, and the disk of the anterior pair is marked with 

 a rhomboidal white patch, more intensely coloured exteriorly. 



There are four specimens of this insect, two of each sex, contained in the Honourable Company's 

 Museum. The species, although but little known, appears to have an extensive range ; Eastern India is men- 

 tioned by Fabricius as the native place on the authority of Dr. Koenig. The collection of A. H. Haworth, Esq. 

 contains a female specimen from Bengal. Another species was bred from the caterpillar, and the chrysalis 

 which produced it is represented on our first plate, fig. 2, b. The caterpillar feeds on a leguminous plant. 

 The only individual obtained passed into the pupa state before an opportunity existed of delineating it, and 

 I subsequently sought it in vain. The history of this species will be given after the description of Petavia, 

 at the close of the series. 



In many essential points, the form of the palpi and antennae, the peculiarities of the feet, &c. these insects 

 agree with the character of the genus Polyommatus, but their habit and aspect are very peculiar ; this 

 is owing to the great length and lateral expansion of the wings, to their comparative narrowness, and 

 to their being regularly elliptical and rounded in the anal region. The group to which this insect belongs, 

 forms in my opinion a distinct subgenus, to which I have given the name of Pithecops, from the peculiar 

 aspect of the chrysalis. Our insect, which is cited by Fabricius as " minima in hacjhmilia," is represented 

 in the European Fauna, by the P. Alsus and by several other species which are described by Ochsenheimer 



with 



