84 MELITJ1A ATHALTA. 



the abdomen and thorax, which is broad and rounded. 

 The wing- covers are well defined and rather prominent ; 

 the warmish white colour and texture of the pupa skin 

 may be compared to that of biscuit-china ; each abdo- 

 minal ring is adorned with a transverse brownish- 

 orange bar, having on its hinder edge squarish black 

 spots, or sometimes a black bar with orange spots, and 

 followed by a row of tiny black dots. The back of the 

 thorax is marked with triangular streaks of black, 

 outlined with orange; the antenna-cases and wing- 

 nervures are faintly marked with orange- brown, and 

 the wing- covers and the eye- and leg-pieces with strong 

 black blotches and dashes. (W. B., 3, 72 ; E.M.M. 

 VIII, 258.) 



Melit^ia Artemis. 

 Plate XII, fig. 2. 



I received eggs of this species from Mr. Joseph 

 Merrin, of Gloucester, on the 12th of June, 1871. 

 Mr. Merrin wrote that he secured some pairs of these 

 butterflies in cop. and put the females on growing 

 plants of Scabiosa succisa (Devil's bit scabious) in 

 pots. " The eggs are laid in heaps of a hundred or so 

 on the face of a leaf." The eggs which I received 

 were in two clusters and a few single ones. 



In shape the egg is ovate, i.e. largest below and 

 smallest above, truncated at the top, and slightly 

 flattened at the bottom, ribbed from the top for about 

 half their length, and the rest smooth. They shine 

 much as though varnished, and are of a pale brown 

 colour. (W. B., Note-Book I, 110.) 



On the 23rd of April, 1883, I received from Mr. 

 Stainton four larvae of Melitcea Artemis, which had 

 been sent to him for determination from Swindon, in 

 Wiltshire. They were of different sizes, ranging from 

 five to eleven lines in length. They were velvety- 

 black with black spines, short and blunt tipped, with 



