334 THE PLACE OF MIMICRY 



indeed, these have been rightly made), have doubtless 

 led to the development of combinations within the limits 

 of the group, and the necessity imposed upon species of 

 other groups to adopt the same Warning Colours. Once 

 begun, such a process would of course tend still further 

 to increase the uniformity within each combination. 1 



Now, are there any grounds in the above-mentioned 

 facts for considering the Danaini more distasteful than 

 the Euploeini, or vice versa ? As regards the power of 

 ranging the world and drawing towards them a variety of 

 mimics of all kinds, the Danaini must be considered the 

 superior ; as regards predominance on the one area where 

 they both meet, the Euploeini take the higher place. 

 But in respect to unpalatability there is no reason for 

 considering one more highly protected than the other. 

 Yet in the few cases where representatives of the two 

 groups enter the same synaposematic combination, it is, 

 so far as we know at present, nearly always a Danaine 

 that is attracted, and assumes the characteristic, superficial 

 appearance of the Euploeine type. This is readily ex- 

 plicable, for the reasons given in discussing the case 

 of Melinaea and Heliconius. The Euploeine type is 

 far better known and far more valuable as a warning 

 character than that of the comparatively isolated Danaine 

 which enters the combination. The same association 

 contains not one but several species of Euploea, all super- 

 ficially alike, and between them producing enormous 

 multitudes of individuals. 2 Euploeini of the Trepsichrois 



1 See also p. 358, where the possible role of the male scent brands 

 of the Euploeini is suggested. 



* The same explanation probably holds in a curious example from 

 South America. A species of the Nymphaline genus Colaenis, — C. teksiphe, 

 is a beautiful mimic of a Heliconius with the same specific name, both 

 being black insects with a broad red bar across the fore wing and 

 a pale narrow stripe along the hind wing. There is no doubt about the 

 identification of model and mimic, for the pattern of the Colaenis is 

 isolated, while the Heliconius is in this respect related to many other 

 species of its Sub-Family. I was therefore much surprised to see the 

 mimic put down in a dealer's list at a shilling apiece, while the model 

 was eighteen pence. I wrote for an explanation, and was informed, as 

 I expected, that the prices represented the relative numbers of the 

 specimens sent by collectors. It is probable that here, too, the effect 



