PREPONA. By H. FRuHSTORFER. 551 
set with small hairs, which corresponds about on the whole to the description of grown-up Prepona-larvae 
being, according to Dr. Srrrz, provided with a depression behind the head. 
The genus exclusively comprises species of an uncommonly strong and, at the same time, regular struc- 
ture of the body. The wing-contour is likewise rather uniform (the forewings always pointed, sometimes 
projecting like a sickle) and in more than two thirds of the species even the magnificent blue colouring of the 
median part of all the wings. 
As to the wing-contour, the bluish-black Prepona resemble the genus Aganisthos, while the variegated 
species, by their slight apical rounding, form the transition to the Agrias, being celebrated for their colours, 
with which they also share the same habits and which always exhibit very much rounded forewings. 
Like the palaearctic Charazes, they live in the woods and are fond of rotting fruit or excrements, their 
wings also produce a crackling noise like thick paper when being folded together, what we have also mentioned 
already in Asiatic and Australian Charazes. 
In Santa Catharina I observed Prepona in all the larger forests. The butterflies were, however, by 
no means common and still less they formed a characteristic feature of the landscape, like the Heliconids and 
Morphids. On the contrary, the Prepona lived hidden and timid in the forest-gloom and nearly always in soli- 
tude. The only occasion for observing them was when they came flying to small trees in order to pilfer from 
the emanating sap. Their most favourite meeting-place was the spot where the sweet, fermenting sap was 
emanating from the holes which small beetles had bored into the trees. If such sap-trees, the so-called ,,Wald- 
schenken“, had once been discovered, we could safely depend upon Prepona flying to them in a few minutes, 
especially in intensive sunshine. Then there was always something mysterious about their coming and going. 
The Prepona are by no means gregarious. When lJaértes or demophon were drinking from a sap-hole, and another 
specimen wished to come near it, there was always a short fight. If Prepona are intended to be taken in 
numbers, it is necessary to clear a piccade (a hidden path) in the woods by means of the Bush-knife, at 
best along small water-courses, and to lay out overripe or rotting fruit. After one or two days the butterflies 
appear tossing greedily upon the savoury meal. In places where the forest is very dark, they forget their 
customary timidness over their greediness and eager desire to drink and are easily captured by twos or threes 
at one fruit or bait. ‘ 
Near Pebas on the Upper Amazon, Dr. Haunet has found nine species of Prepona together. They 
were, beside Morpho achilles, the largest of the species that met there at the bait. When they flew to a leaf, 
they always settled at the upper end, according to their habit of resting on the trunk with the head turned 
downwards. It was then a charming sight when next to their unrivalled, towering whitish-grey wings 
there appeared the green under surface of a Catonephele or the black and white of a Pyrrhogyra. On the other 
side sometimes an Ageronia spread out its wings, or an Adelpha. Of all the neotropical butterflies, the Prepona 
have, according to Hannut, the fastest and wildest flight, as we may easily suppose when regarding their stout, 
strong thorax. Whereas the Morphids are far-roving species flying for hours in one direction and being, there- 
fore, not even frightened by wide sheets of water, the Prepona, like most of the Nymphalids, are fond of remai- 
ning near their breeding-place. There they are at home, and it seems that they are kept back by the fondness 
of their home and a somewhat faint-hearted feeling, so that they are very seldom seen reconnoitring to 
remote groups of trees. 
They generally very often repeat their flying expeditions; they very quickly scent the bait laid 
out by the collector, descend to the ground and are cheated and captured there. But even when being chased 
up they do not fly far away and hide in the nearest thicket with their wings clapped together, in order to return 
rather obstinately to their former place. This habit I also noticed in Prothoé francki Godt. in Java and some 
Charazes in Siam. For hours I was standing in the highlands of Lagos or in the river-dales of the coast-region 
in the forest, in order to wait for the butterflies. In the meanwhile I became aware of many other mysteries 
of that untouched nature there. In great numbers parrots flew from one Araucania to another, or a glistening 
green tree-snake was wriggling along the branches. Beside the Prepona there appeared occasionally a Caligo 
martia, and Opsiphanes sulcius or fruhstorferi were also enticed. 
Like Prothoé francki, the Prepona have the same peculiar habit of drinking with their heads turned 
downward, at what already Dr. Hauneu (Iris 1890 p. 290) and Orro Micwagt (Iris 1894 p. 220) have been 
hinting. 
The latter also reports the interesting fact that a Prepona pheridamas returned to the same place every 
day for 2months. In Santa Catharina the appearance of the Prepona depends on the season, they grow common 
only during the southern midsummer, in December, and then they are met until the end of March. HaHNnEL 
(Iris 1890 p. 276, 277) reports of Prepona arriving more frequently at the bait beginning from December, near 
Sao Paulo on the Upper Amazon. Jutius Micuantis, according to his verbal statement, has come across 
numbers of them in Obidos already in August. MapinpzE reports that catachlora and chalciope occur in Rio 
Grande do Sul during the whole summer, and miranda in summer and autumn. Srrrz (Eine Lepidopterologische 
Reise um die Welt, Wiesbaden 1893) met them in the middle of March near Santos and writes: ,,Their rapid 
