BUTTERFLIES OF SAMOA AND SOME NEIGHBOURING ISLAND-GROUPS. 39 



blooms ; both sexes are more frequently seen flying round the food-plant than 

 in any other circumstances. It is commonest at the edge of forest, and is 

 never found (in Samoa) much above 1,000 feet, though the food-plant, a small 

 tree, Xylosma suaveolens Forst., (Flacourttaceae) occurs up to at least 2,000 feet. 

 My notes on the early stages were made from Samoan material. 



The egg is yellow and almost spherical, 0*67 mm. in height and 0'77 mm. 

 in diameter, the surface marked with about twelve longitudinal and thirteen 

 transverse ribs. The eggs are laid singly on the underside of a leaf, and the 

 egg-laying habits of the female are very curious. The insect settles on the 

 upperside of the leaf, and bends her abdomen underneath to attach the egg ; 

 when possible she chooses a leaf with a hole in it, in which case she inserts the 

 tip of her abdomen through the hole. She is not at all particular about laying 

 on the food-plant, for eggs are frequently to be found on any other plant that 

 happens to be near by. The egg-stage lasts two days. 



The larva (PI. IV, fig. 6) is coloured as follows : Head pale red-brown ; 

 body above spiracular line light brown, with an interrupted paler dorsal line ; 

 spiracular line white ; prolegs, and body below spiracular line greenish. There 

 is a pair of long, branched, blackish, spines on the prothorax, and three pairs 

 of shorter pale brown spines on each of the other body-segments. Length 

 about 26 mm. when full-grown. The larva feeds either exposed on the upper- 

 side of a leaf, or hidden on the underside, and when disturbed drops by a thread 

 to the ground. 



The pupa (PL IV, fig. 7) is attached to a vein on the underside of a leaf 

 of the food-plant. There is a pair of short dorsolateral spines on the head, 

 another short pair on the thorax, and a pair of long dorsal spines on segments 

 2, 4, and 6 of the abdomen. The colour is pale green ; there is a short streak 

 of metallic silver on the dorsum of the wing-cases, and the two spines of each 

 pair on the abdomen are joined dorsally by a patch of silver. The imago hatches 

 after seven days. Larvae were found in June, August, November and December. 



13. Atella exulans, sp. n. 

 Male (PI. II, fig. 13). Upperside bright tawny-yellow with slight purple 

 iridescence, black markings as follows : Forewing, four sinuous lines in the 

 cell and a bar along the discocellular veins, beyond this a somewhat triangular 

 oblique bar extending from the costa to vein 4, where it almost touches a small 

 triangular spot in interspace 3 ; a transverse series of small postdiscal spots, 



