COLEOPTERA. 115 



halfway between the submarginal row of spots and the tliscoidal spot, 

 but may occiu' much nearer to the sul)marginal series and even in a 

 regular curve without obsolescence or confluence or mixture such as 

 may occur with all underside aberrations. My friends and I always 

 call this form which spreads '' discrefa,'' and the form with opposite 

 tendency " <iloiiicrata," where submedian and basal spots cluster round 

 the discoidal with oi without mixture of cnnjinicta or ohsnleta develop- 

 ment (since described with reference to this species and A. coridon, A 

 Xat. Hist. Brit. Butts., iv., p. 16). Either of these two, " ilhcn'ta'' or 

 " liloiiierata,'' occurs separately on hindwings or forewings, or all 

 together often asymmetrically. I have diacreta in Aijriades mri'lon, 

 rifln'iiis arf/itu (aci/on), Aricia astrarche and I'oliioiiDiiatiia icarus : and 

 filni/urata in A. aatrarrhe, and /'. iranis, and have seen it in A. carithm, 

 besides having both in several specimens of A. thetis {bellar<ius). 



Colour. — A. ab. czekelii, Aign.-Abafi. — Grey after frost. On 

 p. 389 is noted: — "Ten days after frost,"'' should be about September 

 lOtb, after two nights' frost. The frosts were, I think, on September 

 11th and 12th, and the insects were taken on the 13th and ]4th. 1 

 went because of the frosts, as in the " Webb collection " are steel-grey 

 specimens of r? s taken under similar conditions, except that the 

 frosts were more severe. Two were taken in Surre}' on the fiist day 

 after the 2nd frost, and a third at Lewes the next day after that. 



Length of time that the first brood is ox the wing. — Since the 

 year 1902 I have found A. thcfis in July every year, except 1909, when 

 I was too busy to go out after June 26th, at which date there were plenty 

 to be had. In 1907, on July 23rd, both sexes of Auriadea tlietis, A. 

 coriibni, I'leheiio^ artfiis {acijon), Pob/onnnatiis icanis, and Aricia astrarche, 

 with 3 Ciipido imniiinis, were taken in one valley near Dover. 



Variation in discoidal spots of underside. — I have two complete 

 specimens of ab. discoidalis-niilla, Tutt (p. 337), one taken in Kent in 

 1905, second brood, and the other in 1909, also in Kent and of the 

 second brood. Several of my specimens have discoidals missing on 

 one wing, c;/., one from Surrey in 1907, but all these, both in Mr. 

 Grosvenor's and my own collections, are teratological examples, in 

 which the costa of the primaries is more or less concave. All my 

 specimens are largely obsoleta, or else with large white wedges 

 running from the margin towards the base ; Grosvenor's example was 

 not nbsoh'ta. It was taken in Surrey in 1907. I have seen no specimen 

 with a discoidal spot absent without some imperfect development in 

 the shape of the wing. 



(gfOLEOPTERA. 



Coleoptera at Wicken Fen in September, 1909. — In addition to 

 those species given by my friend, Mr. Donisthorpe (vol. xxi., p. 231), 

 I find I took the following: — In sedge refuse, Habrocerus rafiillari- 

 (■(ir)ils, Gr., Ueterot/io/'s dissiniilis, Gr., Leistotraplms intirhiim, L., 

 l'/iiln)itJtus innhratilis, Gr., /'. rerualis, Gr., Steniifi ni(/ritiiltis, Gyll., 

 S. bif or eolatus, Gyll., N. latifronx, Er., Lesteva punctata, Er., 

 Scj/dinaoiiis collaris, ^[iill., Sllji/ia tristis, 111., Corticaria creuicnllis, 

 Ms^nnh. , ('ah/idnnieriis d)d)ins, M&vsh., by sweeping in the fen, Apion 



" I did not myself record the capture. The insects were exhibited at the 

 City ot London Entomological and Natural History Society. 



