SATYRWJE. 
151 
case in the Himalayas, insectivorous birds being especially numerous there during the 
south-west monsoon, when the ocellate type of butterfly prevails.” 
Mr. Doherty (J. A. S. Bengal, 1889, 118) gives us some subsequent observations 
which he made on the Upper Assam frontier between August and December, and in 
other parts of the East, stating that cc The season was a very poor one, the cold 
weather commencing earlier than usual. The dry-season, non-ocellate brood of Mycalesis , 
Melanitis , Junonia , &c., appeared about the end of September, and none but rubbed 
and ragged individuals of the wet-season brood were seen flying after that date. 
My theory of the effect of drought and humidity (somewhat like that of heat and 
cold on certain European species) on the shape and ocellation of these butterflies has 
now received confirmation from various sources. In Eastern Java and the neighbour¬ 
ing islands of Sumba, Sambawa, and Timor, the seasons are the reverse of those in 
India, the winter months—December, January and February—being the rainy ones. 
I found the broods of the Satyridm similarly reversed there, the wet-season form 
coming out late in the autumn, and the dry-season one in the spring. This is of 
course only indirect evidence, but direct evidence has not been wanting. Mr. de 
Niceville, who early adopted my views on this subject, some time ago reared 
Mycalesis mineus from the eggs of M. visala , and has lately bred both forms of 
Melanitis Leila under natural conditions from the eggs of the ocellate one. This, 
however, took place at the time of the change of monsoon. At any other time it 
must be very unusual for both forms to come from the same parent. Two years ago, 
in the early part of the dry season in the island of Sambawa, I succeeded in obtain¬ 
ing both Melanitis Leda and ismene from the eggs of Leda by keeping a wet sponge 
in the box in which the former species was reared. I particularly recommend this 
experiment to naturalists living in the East, as Melanitis lays its eggs with unusual 
facility in captivity, and the larva feeds on young growing rice, which is always 
obtainable. ... It tv as perhaps the general destruction of forests in the long- 
settled parts of the East—India, China, Java—whether by the agency of nature or by 
that of prehistoric man, that gave rise to seasonal dimorphism in the Satyridse. In 
the wet, dark woodland, their ocelli served them as a protection. Then came the 
change; the country was partly deforested, and, instead of the former uniformly 
damp climate, there was a long dry season in which the rank vegetation withered, 
the sunlight entered everywhere, and the ocellate butterflies were rendered conspi¬ 
cuous. Some species disappeared from the regions thus affected, while others lost 
their ocelli and assumed the angular shape and dull neutral colouring of dry leaves, 
and so survived. In the less variable climate of the equatorial regions, this has 
rarely taken place, and generally only the ocellate broods are found there. And in 
desert regions, instances may perhaps occur where the ocellate form has altogether 
disappeared.” 
