152 THE entomologist's record. 



margin, both being in the form of a single continuous curve. This 

 distinction will, I believe, be found to be invariable. 



Cupido osiris, Meig. = Cupido sebrus, Bdv. 



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



The following matter conies outside the scope of my work in A 

 Natural History of the British Lepidoptera, and, as I have already 

 finished what I have to say about the Cupidid species in vol. x of 

 that work, it may be well to note the fact whilst it is in my mind, viz., 

 C. osiris, Meig. = C. sebras, Bdv. 



I have been recently working through Meigen, an author whom 

 one would have supposed Staudinger knew very well, and yet whose 

 work appears to have been a good deal overlooked ; probably this is 

 due to the fact that, like so many authors who illustrated their work 

 by hand, the colouring is sometimes wonderfully crude, and, as Esper 

 and Gerhard love "royal" blue, Bergstriisser "white" blue, so 

 Meigen loved " pale " blue, and one finds the figures of the " blues " 

 often running to excess in these directions. 



At first I thought that osiris must be a form of ('. sewian/us, but 

 the figure Avas quite unsatisfactory from this point of view, especially 

 the spotting of the underside of the hindwing, and it was not till I 

 obtained a critical translation of the description from Mr. Sich that I 

 saw, what I ought to have known at once from the underside, that the 

 species must be sebrus. This description reads as follows : — 



Above violet ; fringe white, with black base ; i^ale grey beneath ; in the centre 

 of each wing is a black transverse streak, then a curved row of small black eye- 

 spots, cf . The upperside reddish-blue, not so deep and much duller than in the 

 previous species (acis), the black marginal border is absent, on the other hand, the 

 fringes are, for half their breadth, deep black (which one might easily take for a 

 black margin), the other half is white. The nervures are not black, only their 

 terminations on the outer margin scarcely blackish ; the underside is very pale 

 reddish -grey, clearer and more delicate than in the previous species (acts) ; the 

 basal third of the hindwings verdigris-green. In the centre of each wing lies a 

 black transverse streak bordered with white ; on the forewings there is a curved 

 row of seven eye-spots and a similar row on the hindwings of six to seven spots ; 

 between the first and second, as well as between the fourth and fifth, there is an 

 interval ; at the base on the edge of the green are yet two eyespots, one below the 

 other. Of this butterfly, I only possess the male, whose country of origin is 

 unknown to me, it is certainly distinct from acis. 



The description and figures together make it absolutely certain that 

 the species here referred to is that we know as sebrus, Bdv. The 

 description of the fringes would alone be almost diagnostic, but the 

 spotting of the underside of the hindwing in the figure is equally so, 

 and is identical with specimens in our own collection, m which spots 

 2 and 6 are vv'anting. The only point, perhaps, not in quite full agree- 

 ment with the species is the colour-tint of the base of hindwings, 

 which Mr. Sich translates for us as " verdigris-green," but which is 

 rather "verdigris-blue" in most examples than "green," although a 

 tinge of the latter colour is sometimes observable ; strangely, Meigen 

 leaves this out altogether in his figure. The synonymy of the species 

 will, therefore, in future read — 



Osiris, Meig., " Eur. Schmett.," ii., p. 7, pi. xlvi., figs. 3 a-h (1830). Sebrus, 

 ?Hb., "Eur. Schmett.," pi. 172, fig. 8.54 {ante 1832) ; Bdv., "Icon.," p. 72 pro 

 parte, pi. xvii., figs. 1-3 (1832); Tr., " Die Schmett.," x., pt. 1, p. 65 (1834); H.-Sch., 

 " Sys. Bearb.." i.,p. 116i)ii«w( (1843); Dup., " Cat.," p. 31 (1844) ; Frr.,"Neu. 



