COMPSOGEXE. 107 



yellow. Horn glaucous-green : legs pink, prolegs and claspers 

 green ; anal flap and claspers green edged with yellow. 

 Spiracles oval, flush, violet-grey with a narrow blue central 

 slit. Length 110 mm. : breadth 16 mm. : horn 20 mm. 



Pupa. — Stout in build ; vertex of head at right angles to 

 the axis of the pupa ; tongue reaches to tip of wing-case. 

 fore leg to about the middle of wing-case, antenna slightly 

 shorter and mid-leg slightly longer ; a small coxal piece. 

 Surface moderately shining, coarsely and shallowly rugose, 

 with minute tubercles on the rugosities : costal margins of 

 wings beaded, sculpturing on segment 4 a bracket -shaped, 

 transverse, narroAV, shining line on each side of dorsum : 

 segment 4 also deeply transversely furrowed by two broad 

 parallel channels ; 5, 6 and 7 each with three depressed lines 

 parallel with their margins ; ante-spiracular ridges on 9 to 11 

 in the form of four parallel ridges on each ; front margins of 

 9 to 11 tumid behind the bevelled portions, the tumidity 

 deeply pitted ; spiracle of 2 indicated by a long, flat, narrow, 

 black strip on front margin of thorax, with a crescent-shaped 

 slit in front of it, the other spiracles sunken ovals with raised 

 centres. Cremaster short and triangular, constricted near 

 base, surface shining and rugose, a deep hollow on each 

 side of the ventral surface penetrating to the dorsal surface 

 and thus making a perforation. Colour dark red-brown, 

 nearly black on segments 1 to 3 and on 13 and 14. Length 

 58 mm. ; breadth 15 mm. 



Habits. — Egg laid singly on the underside of a leaf. In 

 India the most common food-plant is Mangifera indica Linn, 

 (mango), family Anacardiaceae, and we have also bred it on 

 Calophyllum inophyllum Linn., family Guttiferae ; Mell records 

 other food-plants of the same two families in China. 



The larva lives on the underside of a leaf, generally choosing 

 one in a dense cluster. It lies stretched out straight when 

 at rest, is sluggish, and feeds chiefly at night. Before leaving 

 the food-plant to pupate it becomes suffused Avith brown- 

 pink, and later is somewhat greasy looking. Pupation in a cell 

 underground. The pupal stage lasts about three weeks 

 except in the case of hibernating pupae, when it may last as 

 many months or even longer. The moth is one of the most 

 beautiful of Indian sphingids. It is sluggish during the day- 

 time and allows itself to be handled, but at night it flies 

 strongly. We have never seen it feeding at flowers, nor have 

 we ever known it to come to light, though Mell states that it 

 has frequently been caught at light in Java. It emerges from 

 the pupa after dark, and pairs after midnight when in captivity. 

 When resting the wings are spread widely in a plane below 

 the horizontal, the fore wings not quite covering the hind 

 wings, the latter just covering the sides of the abdomen : 



