THE LEPIDOPTERA OF SAVOIE. 



225 



resulting from larva? taken along with the above, going over. Emme- 

 lesia decolorata continued out on the 25th, and, on the 28th, I took 

 two males of Satyrus semele on the shore. I was also fortunate 

 enough to take a slight aberration of the female of Polyomm.atus icarus 

 with a dash along the inner margin (underside) of the forewing. I 

 also captured a male with three red spots on the upperside of the 

 hindwings. [This is most exceptional. What was the character of 

 the spots ? — Ed.] Up to the present (September 17th) the season 

 has only been very moderate, and insects have been very much out of 

 their time owing to the bad weather. I was quite unable to get 

 ( 'oenonympha tvphon (davus) and many other species through bad 

 weather during week-ends. One notable item of the year has been 

 the entire absence of larva? of Aglais urticae here. 



The Lepidoptera of Savoie— Gresy-sur=Aix and Mont Revard. 



By J. W. TUTT, F.E.S. 

 With the morning of August 20th, another move was made, this 

 time to Aix les-Bains, a rather long and tiring journey on a hot day, 

 but safely reached, and the morning of August 21st found me on the 

 road to Gresy-sur-Aix. Here everything was absolutely parched, there 

 had been no rain for weeks, and the usual haunts were a wilderness, 

 the plants withered, the flowers absent, the herbage often dried, but 

 how delightful is the return, if only for a few hours, to the old place, 

 to see the insects and flowers one feels one knows so well. Since my 

 first introduction to the Gresy hills, by Dr. Chapman, some thirteen 

 summers before, I have revisited them again and again, and to me they 

 breathe the freshness of renewed vigour, for here I love to rest a few 

 days, before attempting the, to me, more arduous work on the higher 

 mountains, and to prepare, as it were, for the labour to come. Some- 

 how, I never feel worried about what I am likely to catch at Gresy 

 now ; I feel that I long ago exhausted the butterflies that I can 

 possibly take at the time of my visit, and, if a good thing comes my 

 way, I am always glad, and there are many species that are always 

 rare, and that one has to pick up a series by getting a specimen or two 

 at the time. On the lovely hot morning of the 21st 'then, I went 

 along, most lazily inclined, and picked up the Melitaea parthenie; 

 M. didyma, M. cinxia, and Brenthis dia as the fates offered them, 

 and studiously left the Callimorpha //era on the flowers of the 

 tall thyme plants. I wish some of our subscribers would tell me 

 just before starting for the summer holiday that they wanted ova of 

 C. hera, because it is some excuse to take a few females, and I do 

 like to catch the lovely creatures, and while, as at present, a purpose 

 is wanting, I have not a real reason for disturbing them. The M. 

 parthenie, as usual, gave some heavily-marked females, and made one 

 again doubt the alpine race of M. athalia. All our common Melitreas 

 have alpine races — M. parthenie has its yar,. carta, M. dictynna its small 

 form alpina, M. aurelia its race alpina and its ? still higher alpine race 

 asterie, and .1/. athalia, I .believe, a heavily-marked race that haunts the 

 valleys up to about 5000ft., not much smaller than the typical form of 

 the lowland woods. Here I may note that I seem to have erroneously 

 recorded the captures of M. asterie on the alps of south-eastern France, 

 for the species I took, and meant to record, was certainly .1/. var. raiia, 



