A BUTTERFLY HOLIDAY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 219 



border and a series of black spots at the edge of the hindwings : when 

 q\iite fresh they are nearly white on the underside, like the second- 

 brood in Central Italy, and approaching the var. hijiiochiona of the 

 Pyrenees, except in size. I was too late for (\ ti/>lion, and the only 

 good specimen I took was a 2 , though I found a few passable examples 

 of both sexes. There was never a day when it was possible to go to 

 Ambleside, and in any case I was too late for /•,'. epiphnm. T took both 

 the Argynnids, but they were really over and not worth keeping, as 

 was also the case with the 1st brood of /'. icatnx. and mostly with A. 

 i)inln)i^ which is single brooded here. I was also between the broods 

 of ' . pniuii/iiliix, of which 1 only saw one 2 . K.jnrtina was common 

 anil tine, with very pronounced yellow bands on the underside, some- 

 times even in the J s- //• ^enwh' was tlying but did not seem common. 

 Indeed, except in the " moss" in which /'. aiyici {ae(ion) occurred, one 

 might walk for hours without seeing a butterfly, and the only moths 

 that were common were Kiiiatunia atouiaria and a pale ('ra)iibns 

 (lifilelliis, I think). An occasional Atitiiadi'n si/lrnnua was to be seen, 

 and I'ieris }ia})i was fairly common, large, and well-marked. Jlupaliis 

 pinioria was pretty frequent among the pines, which also produced a 

 few Schiiot/iisa Utura : on one of the the mosses there were also a few 

 Srliiloseiiia ericitaria {plumaria) of both sexes. But even in such 

 weather as we experienced Witherslack was a delightful place, and I 

 sincerely hope to visit it again. The journey across to the Durham 

 Coast, though only about 80 miles, took 8^ hours, of which ih were 

 spent in waiting at stations, and necessitated 5 changes. We put up 

 at the " Blackball Rocks" Hotel, which has the advantage of being 

 within ten minutes of some of the best ground for the various forms of 

 A. iiii'ilnit for which this coast is remarkable, and is in fact the only 

 place in which it is at all possible to stay. 1 had been kindly furnished 

 by Mr. J. H. Harrison with a plan of the coast, pointing out all the 

 available denes and telling me which forms I might hope to find in 

 each. Here again the weather was very bad, some days being hopeless 

 from morning till night, but I was fortunate enough to get some very 

 nice forms, almost all in the dene nearest to the hotel, some ten 

 minutes' walk to the north of it. I made two expeditions to the three 

 northernmost denes (about three miles ott"), of which Mr. Harrison 

 spoke very highly, but on each occasion only saw one worn specimen 

 in the second dene, and none at all in either of the others. These 

 denes, at this time of year at any rate, contain four species of butter- 

 flies only: — P. icani.s, A. tiwilon, ( '. pampliiliis, smd /•,'. ,/Nr///)rt, except 

 for a very occasional Atilais uiticac. P. irarus is really magnificent 

 both in size and colour, the S s reminding one, on the upperside, of 

 the specimens from Central Italy, but the 2 s are all considerably 

 sufi'used with blue, which I have never seen in Central Italian speci- 

 mens. Stephens' definition of lut'ihin var. sabnaris is most unfortunate, 

 as the white discoidal on the forewings is certainly commoner in the 

 S (ab. aiiiiilis) than in the $ . Many of the specimens of this species 

 here are simply small A. inedon, with a slight tendency towards 

 obsolescence of the spots on the underside hindwing. White ^;cales 

 around a black discoidal (so frefjuently, and (^[uite erroneously, referred 

 to as var. .sN////rtr/,s, the original description of which absolutely excludes 

 such specimens) did not very freq\iently appear, though it occurred in 

 both sexes, but I obtained three magnificent examples of ab. rcilrae, 



