From eggs of var. Telamonides laid on the last of May larvæ were obtained, which gave on June 22nd-26th, 122 pupæ. These, as fast as formed, were placed on ice in the refrigerator in small tin boxes, and when all the larvæ had become transformed the pupæ were transferred to a cylindrical tin box (4 in. diam. and 6 in. high), and packed in layers between fine shavings. The tin box was set in a small wooden one, which was put directly on the ice and kept there till July 20th. From that date, by an unfortunate accident, the box, instead of being kept on the surface of the ice in an ice-house, as was intended, was placed on straw near the ice, so that the action of the cold was modified, the outside pupæ certainly experiencing its full effects, but the inside ones were probably at a somewhat higher temperature. The ice failed on August 20th, so that the pupæ had been subjected to an equable low temperature in the refrigerator for three to four weeks, and to a lesser degree of cold in the ice-house for five weeks, the temperature of the last place rising daily, as the ice had all thawed by August 20th. On opening the box it was found (probably owing to the cold not having been sufficiently severe) that the butterflies had commenced to emerge. Twenty-seven dead and crippled specimens were removed, together with several dead pupæ. One butterfly that had just emerged was taken out and placed in a box, and when its wings had fully expanded it was found to be a “Telamonides of the most pronounced type.” The experimenter then states:—“Early in the morning I made search for the dead and rejected butterflies, and recovered a few. It was not possible to examine them very closely from the wet and decayed condition they were in, but I was able to discover the broad crimson band which lies above the inner angle of the hind wings, and which is usually lined on its anterior side with white, and is characteristic of either Walshii or Telamonides, but is not found in Marcellus. And the tip only of the tail being white in Walshii, while both tip and sides are white in Telamonides, enabled me to identify the form as between these two. There certainly were no Walshii, but there seemed to be a single Marcellus, and excepting that all were Telamonides.”
The remaining pupæ were kept in a light room where 3 Telamonides emerged the following day, and by September 4th 14 specimens of the same variety had emerged, but no Marcellus or intermediate forms. From the 4th to the 20th of September a few more Telamonides appeared, but between the 4th and 15th of the month 12 out of 26 butterflies that had emerged were intermediate between Telamonides and Marcellus, some approximating to one form and some to the other form. The first pure Marcellus appeared on September 4th, and was followed by one specimen on the 6th, 8th, 13th and 15th respectively. From this last date to October 3rd, 6 out of 10 were Marcellus and 3 intermediate. On September 3rd, a specimen intermediate between Telamonides and Walshii emerged, “in which the tails were white tipped as in Walshii, but in size and other characters it was Telamonides, though the crimson band might have belonged to either form.” Butterflies continued to emerge daily up to September 20th, after which date single specimens appeared at intervals of from four to six days, the last emergence being on October 16th. Thus, from the time the box was removed from the ice-house, the total period of emerging was fifty-seven days, some specimens having emerged before the removal of the box. With specimens of P. Ajax which appear on the wing the first season the natural pupal period is about fourteen days, individuals rarely emerging after a period of four to six weeks.
Between August 20th and October 16th, the 50 following butterflies emerged:—
| Total. | |||
| Telamonides | 22 | 12 males, | 10 females. |
| Telamonides partly Walshii | 1 | 1 female. | |
| Medium, nearest Telamonides | 8 | 5 males, | 3 females. |
| Medium, nearest Marcellus | 6 | 4 males, | 2 females. |
| Marcellus | 13 | 9 males, | 4 females. |
| 50 | 30 males, | 20 females. | |
All these butterflies were very uniform in size, being about that of the ordinary Telamonides. The specimens of Telamonides especially were “strongly marked, the crimson band in a large proportion of them being as conspicuous as is usual in Walshii, and the blue lunules near the tail were remarkably large and bright coloured. Of the Marcellus, in addition to the somewhat reduced size, the tails were almost invariably shorter than usual and narrower, and instead of the characteristic single crimson spot, nearly all had two spots, often large. In all these particulars they approach Telamonides.”
Adding to the Telamonides which emerged after August 20th most of those specimens which were found dead in the box at that date, the total number of this form is thus brought up to nearly 50. Of the 122 pupæ with which Mr. Edwards started, 28 remained in a state fit for hibernation, several having died without emerging. Previous experiments had shown that 28 out of 122 pupæ is not an unreasonable number to hibernate, so that the author concludes that the butterflies which emerged the same season would have done so naturally, and the effect of the artificial cold was not “to precipitate the emerging of any which would have slept” till the following spring. Now under ordinary circumstances all the butterflies which emerged the same season would have been of the Marcellus form, so that the cold changed a large part of these into the form Telamonides, some (probably from those pupæ which experienced the lowest temperature) being completely changed, and others (from those pupæ which were only imperfectly subjected to the cold) being intermediate, i.e., only partly changed. It appears also that several pupæ experienced sufficient cold to retard their emergence and stunt their growth, but not enough to change their form, these being the 13 recorded specimens of Marcellus. Had the degree of cold been equal and constant, the reversion would probably have been more complete. The application of cold produced great confusion in the duration of the pupal period, the emergence, instead of taking place fourteen days after the withdrawal of the cold, as might have been expected from Dr. Weismann’s corresponding experiment with Pieris Napi ([Appendix I]. Exps. [13] and 14), having been extended over more than two months.
From the results of this experiment it must be concluded that Telamonides is the primary form of the species.
Additional Experiments with Papilio Ajax.
[Communicated by Mr. W. H. Edwards, November 18th, 1879.]