NOTES FROM THE SARAWAK MUSEUM. 257 



in the coil and impaled by pressure on the chitinous comb of the 

 4th segment ; a hold is then gained with the mouth, an I after a 

 few minutes, with a rapid sinuous motion, the larva straightens 

 out and disappears below the sand, carrying its prey with it. If 

 the larva is not successful in catching- its prey the first time, it 

 flings sand about in all directions by rapid switching movements, 

 and the victim, unable to obtain a foothold on the sliding sides 

 of the pit-fall, falls down to the bottom ; or occasionally the 

 larva actually strikes like a snake at the victim as it endeavours 

 to escape from the toils, indeed many of (he actions of this larva 

 are quite snake-like, and an ant enclosed in one of its coils re- 

 minds one of nothing so much as of a small mammal in the grasp 

 of a pylhon. Occasionally the prey seems somewhat out of 

 proportion to the larva, but by means of the numerous seta? on 

 the large posterior segments a very firm grip is obtained in the 

 sand, and I have never yet seen an insect of moderate size make 

 good his escape after having been once seized. I brought down 

 to Kuching alive several of these larva?, and one or two pupa- 

 ted ; shortly before pupation, the larva leaves its pit-fall and lies 

 close to the surface of the sanJ, though completely covered; 

 the anterior segments become much swollen and retracted, un- 

 til the integument bursts, revealing beneath the brownish pupa ; 

 by some convulsive movements the whole pupa now appears at the 

 surface, the larval skin being slowly shuffled off backwards, but 

 never becoming eutirely freed, so that the posterior end of the 

 pupa always presents a somewhat ragged appearance, Unfor- 

 tunately the heat of Kuching proved too much for these pupa?, 

 and none came to maturity, but shrivelled up ; some Leptid flies 

 which I obtained on Penrissen are, however, I am sure, the 

 adult stage. 



On a male specimen of Purlisa Giganteus Dist. 



A specimen of this handsome Lyca±nid butterfly was described 

 and figured by Distant in his Rhopalocera Malay ana (p. 250. Tab. 

 XXI. fig, 28. 1885), but the sex was not stated either in this or 

 in two previous descriptions (Distant, Eiit. Month. Mag. Vol. 

 XVII. p. 245,1881, and Waterhouse, Aid. Vol, I. pi. XLVI, 

 1882), and de Niceville in his " Butterflies of India," Vol. iii. p. 



