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Show 1886.] MR. H. J. ELWES ON THE GENUS PARNASSIUS. 43 some degree analogous to that of P. tenedius, is utterly unlike that of any known Parnassius. It is very curious that though M . Oberthur has received many examples of the female, he has as yet no male, as it will be most interesting to examine the clasping organs, in order to see whether they differ from those of P. charltonius, which I have figured, in as marked a manner as the female appendage does ; M . Oberthur, who figures this organ well, says that he has two virgin females in which it is not developed. There is some variation in the number of the large blue ocelli on the hind wing of this grand insect ; normally they are two in number, but one specimen figured by M . Oberthur has two additional small ones above, which gives it even a stronger resemblance to P. charltonius, in which five is the usual number. The antennae are black, the fringes of the fore wings black, edged with white, and of the hind wings plain white. This grand species was discovered by the French missionary bishop of Tibet, M . Felix Biet, at Ta-tsien-lo, a town near the frontiers of China and Tibet, at about 7500 feet elevation, where it flies all the summer, and may probably extend throughout that very inaccessible tract of mountains which have yielded so many zoological and botanical treasures to the researches of Abbe David, and from whence so many new butterflies have recently been described by M . Charles Oberthur. P. CHARLTONIUS. Parnassius charltonius, Gray, Cat. Lep. Brit. Mus. p. 77, t. xii. fig. 7, 6 (1852) ; Moore, Yarkand Mission, Lep. p. 5, t. 1. fig. 3, 2 • This splendid species must be considered, with P. imperator, as the grandest of the whole genus. The superficial resemblance which it bears to P. imperator first led me to study the question of the pouches in this genus, which have been so much neglected, and which in this species is so remarkable. First discovered by Major Charlton at Lapsang, in his journey in Ladak, so memorable in the history of the genus, and figured by Gray, along with P. acco, simo, jacquemonti, and hardwickei, P. charltonius remains one of the rarest and least known of the genus. Dr. Sto-liczka found it again at Kharbu, 13,000 feet, in the same province, and the same naturalist during the Yarkand expedition obtained a female. M . Lionel de Niceville and Capt. Young have both found it at Koksir, below the Baralacha pass, in the province of Lahoul, from 12,000 to 14,000 feet elevation, where in some seasons it is not uncommon from the middle of July to the middle of August, when the females are still fresh. Having had the whole of the specimens collected by these gentlemen under comparison, I find that, in this locality at least, they vary less than most species. None have any red in the usual spots on the fore wing, but on the hind wing is a small red ocellus ringed with black, and sometimes nearly obsolete, near the costa; a large |
