114 
SOUTH-AFRICAN BUTTERFLIES. 
The variations of the under side in this species are so numerous, 
and so finely graduated into each other, that it is impossible to fix upon 
any variety properly so termed, i.e.^ a constant form differing from the 
type. The ground-colour is tinged with ochre, pinkish-red, dark- 
brown, or purple-grey ; the transverse stripes wanting, indicated by 
detached dark blotches, or broadly shaded with dark-brown internally 
(while the ground beyond them is very pale) ; the ocelli very con- 
spicuous in both wings or one wing to their full number, half wanting, 
ill-defined, without rings, without black, very indistinct, or barely 
traceable as whitish or pale dots. The ocellus of upper side of fore- 
wing is sometimes compounded of three black spots. The outline of 
the wings also varies much, especially as regards the fore-wing, the 
hind-margin of which presents every gradation between being almost 
straight (save for a slight prominency in apical region), and the assump- 
tion of an almost falcate form. 
Larva. — Bright yellow, shaded with greenish ; nine longitudinal 
green streaks, viz., one central, dorsal ; and on each side two thin ones 
(subdorsal and lateral), one wider lateral, and one thin just above legs. 
Cephalic horns divergent, projecting almost directly forward, only 
slightly ascendant at extremity. Caudal processes about as long as 
cephalic horns, but stouter at base, acuminate, and less divergent. 
The surface generally is transversely ribbed, and very slightly pubescent. 
Feeds on the Bush Guinea Grass." 
Mr. W. D. Gooch sent me the notes and rough drawing from 
which the above description is made. He observes that the Larva 
was not uncommon on the Natal Coast, and was invariably found 
on the under side of the leaves of its food-plant, generally at the 
base with its head downward. Many of the specimens observed were 
ichneumoned.^ 
Pupa. — Mr. Gooch has given me no record of this stage. The 
figures of the Indian and Cingalese specimens above quoted give the 
pupa as green, rather paler on the wing-covers, which bear two or 
three blackish lines, probably indicating some of the nervures. The 
Indian pupa is represented as attached to a thin stalk, the Cingalese 
to the edge of a broad leaf of a grass. 
In my Rliopalocera Africce Australis {I. c), I recorded my reasons for adding 
JBa7iJiia, Fab., to the array of synonymes attaching to this exceedingly variable 
sj^ecies. In January of the following year (1867), Mr. A. G. Butler, in a paper 
contributed to the Annals and Magazi7ie of Natural History, retained Bankia 
as a variety of Leda, and added to the list M. Helena^ Westw., from " West 
Africa." He gave at the same time an interesting analysis of the various forms 
^ It should be observed that the larva of the Oriental Leda is represented as greener 
than Mr. Gooch describes that of the Natal Leda to be ; and also that in the figure in the 
Lejndoptera of Ceylon, above quoted, the larva is depicted as having the cephalic horns 
rusty-red and perpendicular instead of greenish -yellow and porrect, and as possessing on 
each side of the face a vertical, black, outwardly white-edged stripe running from the base 
of the horn. 
