MORPHO. By H. Fruhstorfer. 339 



it no-w follows, pursuing its way quietly and steadily, with the powerful wings scarcely quivering. It looks 

 then like a narrow silver-blue stripe, in the vestal purity of its delicate wliite colour, which from the middle 

 towards the costal margin changes into a light blue, posteriorly into black. The silver-white and brown of 

 the imder surface, however, present an excellent copy of large withered leaves covered with mildew at the 

 veins, the similarity indeed being so great when it is resting in the shade of the branches that at Villa Bella 

 Dr. Hahxel once took a newly emerged example hanging on the pupa for such a withered leaf, until to 

 his amazement he proved it to be a living form. According to Michael (Iris 1894, p. 197) cisseis fHes in 

 every month, thus all the year roimd. — At Iqm'tos and Yurimaguas on the Upper Amazon cisseis-obidonus 

 is replaced by phanodemus Hew., the forewing of wliich in rare cases still bears traces of the hecuba colouring ■phanode- 

 and is in part somewhat brown-yellow -with the marginal area only slightly blue. But examples with green- '"^■ 

 blue median band seem to be the commonest, this colour sometimes distally changing to olive-green or greenish 

 brown and towards the base to light blue and white. In the $ the shades of colour are less ill-defined and 

 there occur pure and imiform light, dark, steel- and green-blue tinged specimens, to which it may be left 

 to others to give special names. The mider surface agrees completely with our figure 67 c, although it is 

 only exceptionally that the apical ocelli of the hindwing are accompanied posteriorly by a small accessory 

 eye-spot, as in the example from which the figure was drawn. Dr. Hahnel calls phanodemus a kingly form 

 and compares it, in its quiet, peaceful and ghost-like flight, to the tutelary genius of the secret of the forest. 

 Hahxel was only able to obtain phanodemus by erecting a sort of scaffolding of bamboos, which he set up 

 to a height of about 5 m. m the line of flight of the Morphids. In order also to secure the phanodemus 

 which came up from behind a mirror was fixed on the parapet of his tower, which indeed was not often 

 successful, but when it was, gave all the greater satisfaction. ■ — • polyidos subsp. nov. has a very brojid black polyidos. 

 chstal margin to the forewing, increasing in width from the costal margin to the anal angle, but the sub- 

 marginal patches are only sUghtly indicated. The cell of the forewing contains only a few yellowish patches, 

 the median band itself much narrowed. Hindmng basally pale yellow, distally lightly dusted with greenish. 

 Under surface as in hecuba obidonus, except that the ocelli of the hindwing are somewhat smaller. From 

 Itahapa Yarita in Venezuela, collected by Vraz. Type in coll. Staudinger in the Berlin Museum. 



Group Morpho F. (= Leonte Hbn.). 



Species with metallic gloss on the upper surface; upper d.'scocellular short, middle strongly convex proximally, 

 lower concave distally, in the obtuse angle directed towards the anterior median. Cell of the forewing considerably 

 widened towards the apes. Uncus and its lateral clasps relative'y sler^der, valve distally spined. 



M. laertes is the best known of a small group of species wliich differ from all their allies in the chalky, 

 mdlky or silvery white ground-colour, laertes may be easily known by the connected chain of narrow, oblong, 

 ocellated median spots on the underside of the hindwing, wliich have mostly only indistinct wliite pupils and 

 washed-out yello-ndsh bordering. The bluish white colouring is brought out very well in the figure. The 

 upper surface resembles the figured underside, except that the forewing continues narrowly margined with 

 black to about the middle of the mechan area. Hindwing with some elongate black anteterminal and more 

 distinct submarginal patches, laerte^s only inhabits the provinces of Rio de Janeiro and Espiritu Santo and 

 is very common both at Rio and Petropolis from January to March. Larva in nests on various forest-trees. 

 It was first figured by Burmeister. Arrangement of the bristles according to Dr. Wilhelm MIjller as in 

 Morpho hercules. Two sharply chfferentiated local races: laertes Druce (= epistrophis Hbn. [pro parte] $, ipb- laertes. 

 itus Fldr. 2) (68 c), ralatively small, apical patch on the forewing above narrow, as also the black curved spot 

 at the apex of the cell; $ with sharply defined black-brown submarginal crescentic spots on the underside 

 of the hind-nang. All the markings yellow-brown, the intramedian ocelli of the forewing strongly marked, 

 rounded, 9. bright yellowish green, with mother-of-pearl gloss. — ■ eutropius subsp. nov. Larger than laertes, eutropius. 

 ground-colour both above and beneath more blue-green. Forewing vsdth the apical patch more than twice 

 as broad, the black hook at the discocellular more strongly marked. Hindwing in both sexes further with a 

 subterminal series of intraneural striae, united into a median and an anal undulate band; under surface 

 with the markings blackish instead of yellow-brown. The intramedian eye-spots of the forevdng and the 

 chain of ocelM on the hindwing more indistinct, narrower, their component parts more isolated. Espiritu 

 Santo," rare. 



M. catenarius Perry is the oldest name for the species wliich is widely distributed in collections under catenarius. 

 the name of epistrophis Hbn., and which differs from laertes in having the row of ocelli on the hindwing round- 

 ed instead of elongate, and also placed further apart. In addition most catenarius have the distal border 

 of the forewing adorned with isolated black spots, not united into a band, and extending to the anal angle. 

 The $$ are not hke the ^^, as in laertes, but decorated more plentifully with brown spots on the under sur- 

 face and more distinct submarginal undulate bands on the upper surface. There are some $ examples, however, 

 which in the markings approximate to those of the f$. In Santa Catharina, particularly in the more ele- 

 vated localities in the neighbourhood of Theresopolis and on the Alto-Uruguay, there occur commonly together 

 with light 5$ also examples in which on the underside of the hindwing, especially about the cell and in 

 the submarginal region, the ordinarily separated brown bands are broadly diffused, so as to form grotesque . 

 figures and extended undulate bands : = $-f . marmorata Fruhst. In such examples the black distal bordering marmorata. 



