228 I March, 



In one little spot near here, tlie margin of a partly dried up river 

 in the forest, I have captured upwards of sixty species of butterflies 

 (including at least thirty-five genera), and the greater part may 

 be seen, if not caught, any very hot sunny morning during the 

 latter part of February and beginning of March : it is true that many 

 of the species are not represented by many individuals, still, a few are 

 in plenty. Though one may collect nearly every day in the year, still 

 this abundance of butterflies lasts a comparatively short period, not 

 longer, perhaps, than in the temperate zone ; as soon as the I'ains com- 

 mence in April they soon disperse, yet the Pieridce {Callidryas) may 

 be seen flying in troops along the river banks nearly all the year, and 

 Megalura and some Hesperiidcs, for several months, congregating in 

 large numbers in one spot. 



I have observed in the Polochic Valley in Gruatemala, at the end 

 of the dry season (April), a similar abundance of butterflies (though, 

 perhaps, not quite so many species as here in Chiriqui), some fine 

 Papilios (especially a beautiful green and black species) being very 

 common amongst others, and all congregated in one little spot on the 

 sandy banks of the Rio Polochic. In the forests on the mountain 

 slopes (3000 — 5000 feet), even in the densest places, I have taken 

 HetcercE, Taygeiis, OxeoscJiisfes, and 7? /;o««'«,and, wherever an open sj^ace 

 occurred, various Leptalis, Euterpe, Phyciodes, Pierida (P. temdcoriiis, 

 common in Chiriqui), and Satyridce, and more rarely a Papilio, 

 Clothilda, or Paphia. 



Some butterflies appear to avoid the forest altogether, as the 

 Danaidce, Anartia, Agerona, Victorina. The Acrcece, various Papilio, 

 and Thecla, many HesperiidcB {Pyrrliopyge, Eudamus, &c.), some few 

 Seliconiidce, &c., but odd examples will occasionally be seen with 

 forest-loving species on the banks of the river in the virgin forest, in 

 the dry season. 



In Central America, an ordinary traveller will notice, I believe, 

 ten times more butterflies in the dry season than at any other time of 

 the year ; not, pei'haps, because more species are to be found at this 

 period, but because they are concentrated at every damp spot, when the 

 forests are utterly dried up, and many of the trees leafless. 



One is far more disappointed with the Coleopterous fauna of the 

 forests of Central America than with the Lepidoptera. The majority 

 of the species, with some few striking exceptions, are very insignificant 

 in appearance, and scarcely any finer than those of Europe, but this 

 cannot be said of the butterflies. 



For the past month or so, few butterflies have been visible in the 



