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Show 1894.] MANICA, SOUTH-EAST AFRIOA. 31 entire fore wings black with the discal spots conspicuously white), that, having only the descriptions to refer to, I was inclined to think that the female received by Mr. Butler had been erroneously associated with Mr. Godman's female. But on consulting Mr. Butler, he most kindly sent me figures and notes which leave no doubt of the specific identity of these widely differing sexes. There are only two examples of this curious Planema in Mr. Selous's collection, one captured at Umtali, and the other (on February 24th) in Christmas Pass. The former is so much smaller, and has the hind margin of the fore wings so much more hollowed, than the latter, that I took it for a male although entirely of the female coloration; but closer examination has shown it to be a female. Mr. Butler, however, informs me that during 1892 he had seen both males and females in a collection from Kiliraa-njaro, and that one or two of the males were less unlike the female than the rest, the ochre-red covering the basal half only of the fore wingsl. The resemblance borne by the female to Amauris echeria (var. albimacidata, Butl.) is very strong, but I hesitate to adopt Mr. Butler's conclusion that the former is evidently modified in imitation of the Amauris, because, firstly, both Amauris and Planema are equally protected genera and extensively mimicked by Butterflies of other groups, and, secondly, P. johnstoni female does not either in pattern or colouring diverge much from its congeners, coming near P. lycoa, Fabr. Mr. Selous notes that he saw only a few of this Butterfly ; they flew on the border of a stream and settled very frequently. Subfamily NYMPHALIN^E. Genus ATELLA, E. Doubl. 29. ATELLA PHALANTHA (Dru.). Papilio phalantha, Dru. 111. Nat. Hist. i. pi. 21. figs. 1, 2 (1770). Of this most widely ranging species there are five specimens from Christmas Pass and one from the Mineni Valley. 1 Acrcea proteina, C. Oberth. (Etudes d'Ent. xvii. p. 25, pi. i. fig. 4 ; pi. ii. figs. 14, 19, 21 ; pi. iii. fig. 29), is apparently synonymous with P. johnstoni, the specimens recorded and figured being from Urogaro and Usambara in East Africa. Mr. Selous's two examples agree pretty nearly with M . Oberthur's fig. 14 on pi. ii., but one of them is considerably larger and with the median space in the hind wings of a much deeper tint of yellow. The species appears to be highly variable, M . Oberthiir figuring (pi. i. fig. 4) a small male agreeing with the ordinary female except that the spots of the fore wings are pale yellow instead of white; (pi. iii. fig. 29) a female in which the hind wings on both surfaces, and the hind-marginal area of the fore wings on the underside, are deeply tinged with reddish-ochreous ; and (pi. ii. figs. 19 and 21) a male of the typical {johnstoni) colouring, and a female in which the reddish-ochreous is strongly prevalent discally on both surfaces of both fore and hind wings. It will probably be found that in this species of Planema, as in P. esebria (see S.-Afr. Butt. i. pp. 177-78), the varieties are resolvable into two or three in which the sexes more or less agree in coloration. |
