5] 8 L. de Niceville & Dr. L. Martin — Butterflies of Sumatra. [No. 3, 



" Smaller, and the tail always reduced to a projecting tootli." Neither 

 of these characters is constant, in specimens from N.-E. Sumatra the 

 length of the tail especially is very variable, and it is often quite as long 

 as in Indian specimens. In Sumatra P. polytes has two forms only of 

 female : — 



I. Very similar to the male. 



II. Mimicking P. antiphus, Fabricins. This is the P. theseus of 

 Cramer, Pap. Ex., vol. ii, pi. clxxx, fig. B (1777), described from the 

 west coast of Sumatra ; it is also figured by "Wallace in Trans. Linn. Soc. 

 Lond., first series, vol. xxv, p. 52, n. 63, pi. ii, fig. 7 (18(35 ), from Suma- 

 tra. This form has practically no white spots on the disc of the hind- 

 wing as in the corresponding second form of the female of the Indian 

 P. polytes, which there mimics P. aristolochiee, Fabricins, a butterfly 

 which in Sumatra is replaced by P. antiphus, though \ery rarely there 

 is just a trace of a whitish spot in the discoidal cell. Papilio numa, 

 Weber, was described from Sumatra, from the description it would appear 

 to be the ordinary second form of the female of P. polytes found in India, 

 so Weber's habitat is almost certainly incorrect. P. polytes is the most 

 common Papilio of our area, and occurs probably everywhere except at 

 the higher elevations and on the Central Plateau. It flies in gardens, 

 orchards, on roads, near rivers, houses, and villages, and is always to be 

 seen in the neighbourhood of lime trees. The females prefer to lay 

 their eggs on young and low trees of species of Citrus, and deposit 

 three or four eggs only on each bush. The young larvae, like those 

 of P. memnon, Liunams, P. helenus, Linnaeus, and P. nephelus, Boisduval, 

 have a strong superficial likeness to a bird's dropping, which doubtless 

 at this stage greatly protects them. The pupal stage is eleven days 

 only. Heer M. C. Piepers has bred it in Java, and has figured three 

 stages of the larva in Tijd. voor Ent., vol. xxxi, p. 352, pi. viii, figs. 6, 

 7,8 (1888). Rothschild records it from Deli, Sumatra, as P. polytes, 

 Linnams, typical form ; also as P. polytes theseus, Cramer, (g l ), 9 -f. 



javanus, Felder, from Sumatra, rare ; also as P. polytes theseus, Cramer, 

 (i l ), 2 -f. loc. theseus, Cramer, common. 



588. Papilio (Menamopsis) perses, de Niceville. 



P. (Menamopsis) perses, de Niceville, Journ. A. S. B., vol. lxiii, pt. 2, p. 46, n. 40, 

 pi. ir, fig. 7, male (1894). 



P. hewitsonii, Westwood, var. sumatrana, Hagen, Iris, vol. vii, p. 20, n. 11, 

 (1894). 



Hagen as hewitsonii, var. sumatrana. Also very rare, six specimens 

 only in thirteen years, on high elevations not below 3,000 feet on the 

 Central Plateau of the Karo Battaks and in the Gayoe territory in 



