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Show 50 MR. H. J. ELWES ON THE GENUS PARNASSIUS. [Jan. 19, P. clarius, Boisd. Ann. Soc. Ent. Fr. 2nd ser. vol. x. p. 283. P. baldur, W . H. Edw. Can. Ent. xi. p. 142 (1879). P. clarius, W . H. Edw. Butt. N. A. i. p. 17, t. 4. figs. 1-4. P. menetriesii, H. Edw. Proc. Cal. Acad. Dec. 18, 1876. This species, which was described by Menetries from a specimen brought by Wosnesensky from California, is confined to the Western United States, from California northwards at least to British Columbia, and probably further. For an account of its variations, I cannot do better than quote Mr. H. Edwards's notes on the genus Parnassius in Proc. Cal. Acad. July 15, 1878. He says :-"Our most common species is P. clodius, Men., which has a wide range and varies much in different individuals. The typical form of this species, which has the red spots very large and distinct, and the wings nearly opaque, occurs sometimes nearly at sea-level, having been taken by Mr. Behrens at Bodega about 500 feet above the sea, and more recently in large numbers at Tomales in Marin Co. As it approaches the mountains it becomes smaller in size, with the wings more transparent and the spots smaller. It is now known as baldur, Edw. = clarius, Bdv. nee Eversmann. This form is abundant in some portions of the Sierra Nevada, particularly from about Emigrant Gap to the summit of the Central Pacific Railway, 4500 to 8000 feet. Another form, still more distinct, in which the spots are nearly obliterated, the female closely resembling the male of the clodius type, I have ventured to describe as P. menetriesii. This is to be taken also at high elevations, m y specimens coming from Lake Tahoe and neighbourhood, 4000-5600 feet, and one female from the Wahsatch Mountains, Utah, where it was captured by Mr. J. D. Putnam. Mr. Mead took a grand female recently in the Yosemite Valley, at 4200 feet, and induced her to lay eggs on a plant of Sedum, and so we may reasonably hope to know something of the transformations of this exquisite species." Mr. Edwards says further:-" I have no doubt these are all forms of one species, subject to certain variations from change of food, temperature, and other conditions." In Mr. Edwards's ' Butterflies of North America,' what he now calls P. baldur was described and figured as clarius, and he still considers it distinct from clodius ; but there is little doubt that, as Mr. Henry Edwards says, they are varieties of the same species, The form which I have from Washington Territory is the larger one, and some from Plumas Co., California, are intermediate in size. Mr. Crotch took the larger form in Vancouver's Island ; but I do not know how far north it extends, or whether it meets with P. eversmanni on the coast of British America, which is not improbable. The principal character in which it differs from the true Siberian P. clarius is the form of the pouch, which in five specimens in my collection is always shorter and broader than in other forms of this group (see PI. IV. fig. 1); but the yellow hairs of the body and neck and breast will also serve to distinguish it, as these parts are black or grey in P. clarius. Mr. H. Edwards says that P. clodius flies with a short jerky |
