4 
SOUTH-AFRICAISr BUTTERFLIES. 
NymphalincBj but do not present tlie swollen nervures cliaracteristic of 
the latter ; wliile tlie perfect tarsi of tlie fore-legs of the female alto- 
gether separate them from that group of butterflies. It is very 
remarkable, too, to find them sharing with the Danainm a slender but 
distinct internal nervure of the fore-wings anastomosing with the 
submedian nervure ; and it was probably this character which led Dr. 
Felder^ to place them between the Danaince and Erycinidoi. The larva, 
again, is quite unlike that of any group of the Nymphalidm, and is not 
like those known among the other Erycinidm^ but very closely resembles 
that of the totally distinct Fierince ; while the pupa, on the contrary, 
does not differ widely from the Nymphalide type. 
The twelve or thirteen species of this Sub-Family belonging to but 
one genus — Lihytlica — are singularly scattered over all the warmer 
parts of the globe, except, I believe, the continent of Australia and 
Polynesia. The type of the genus, L. Celtis, Fuessly, inhabits Southern 
Europe and Asia Minor ; the Ethiopian Eegion has three species ; 
India and the Indo-Malayan Islands three ; the Austro-Malayan and 
Australasian Islands two or three ; two are natives of the United 
States and the West Indies ; and one is found in Surinam and Brazil. 
It does not seem improbable that these few and widely- scattered con- 
geners are but the surviving representatives of what was at some 
former period a numerous and generally-prevalent group. 
Genus LIBYTHEA. 
Libythea, Fab., " Uliger's Mag., vi. p. 284 (1807);" Latreille, Encyc. 
Meth., ix. p. 10 (18 1 9); Westw., Gen. Diurn. Lep., ii. p. 412 
(1851)- 
Characters those of the Sub-Family. 
There is considerable variation in the different species as regards 
the length of the palpi, which (as Felder has pointed out) attains its 
maximum in the American species ; and L. Celtis is the only member 
of the genus that I have examined which has the antennae so thick and 
so very gradually incrassate from the base. The form of the hind- 
wings is also variable, none of the species rivalling Celtis in the strik- 
ing sinuosity of the costa ; while the hind-margin is in some (the 
Indian MyrrJia, Godt., and allies) rounded, without special prominence 
of any particular dentation, — in the European and American species 
has a moderate projection at the anal angle, and in the African and 
some other species presents a very decided process at the extremity of 
the first median nervule. 
The Lihythem are rather below the middle size, and their colouring 
is mostly rather dull, consisting of a few fulvous or ochreous-yellow and 
white spots on a dark-brown ground, except in the case of the males of 
L. Geoffroyi and Antipoda, which have the upper side violet or violet-blue. 
^ Diagnoses Lcpidopterulogicce, No. VI. p. 10 (Wien. Entom. Monatschr., 1862). 
