NOTES ON THE ENEMIES OF BUTTERFLIES. 269 
During the following three weeks I visited the Papaya tree 
‘on several occasions and always found the same two Mantids. They 
were the same shade of light green as their background and it needed 
the closest scrutiny to detect them. On each visit they were either 
at rest under leaves 01 walking about on the leaf stems, although 
butterflies and other insects were often present on the flowers. 
I do not think that these Mantids were capable of reasoning 
out that insects were to be caught on the flowers. Although they 
were plainly interested in anything moving within six inches of 
them, they would remain just out of reach of «x promising spot 
without attempting to go nearer to it. 
In the Botanic Gardens, at midday on 5th February 1922, I 
was watching four or five “brown” butterflies (Ypthima) settled 
on a single head of flowers on a shrub. <A patch of yellow and 
blue higher up the branch caught my eye, and revealed a large 
“Chamelion ” (Calotes cristatellus). It was some six inches from 
the butterflies, with its head turned towards them in a position of 
attention. I went quietly back to a distance and watched for 
twenty minutes, but the lizard did not stir in the slightest, possibly 
because I had alarmed it. From a distance at which the butterflies 
could easily be seen, it was most difficult to pick it out from the 
surrounding leaves. At subsequent visits I did not see it, although 
the flower-head continued to attract butterflies for some time. 
Another danger to butterflies is the spider. In the Changi 
jungle, on 29th January, 1922, | found an Huthaha merta, a power- 
ful butterfly with a strong flight, completely helpless but undamaged 
in a web spun across a path. ‘The spider could not be found. 
Instances of butterflies being preyed upon by their enemies are 
not easy to observe, but the dangers which they are exposed to, such 
as those indicated in these notes, are very many. 
