LYCAEXINAE: EPIDI'.MIA F.riX ANTIIK. 985 



on them for food. So, too, in an opjjosite way, by tlio accidental or inten- 

 tional flooding of such a locality, the bnttcrHy may again perish and sonie- 

 tiiues also the food plant. Thus Mr. Edwards remarks of Euphydryas 

 phaeton that it absolutely disappeared for four or five years from a swamp 

 in the neighborhood of his residence after a disastrous and long; continued 

 flood of the Kanawha River, and was only restored to its old home by 

 artificial restocking. 



Of all our butterflies it is probable that the Melitaeidi and many of the 

 Chrysophanidi arc the most local, the Vanessidi and Papilionidae the least 

 80, though this statement should by no means be taken too literally ; 

 the exact relation of this localization to the distribution of the food 

 plant can only be properly discussed when the food plants of our cater- 

 pillars are better known, and then by one as familiar with the plants as 

 with the butterflies. 



EPIDEMIA EPIXANTHE — The purple disk. 



[The purple disk (Gosse) ; Epixauthe l)ulteirty (Harris) ; marsli copper (ScudJer) ; brown 



copper (Maynard).] 



Polyommatus epixanthe Bolsd.-LeC. L^p. Lycaena epixanthe Harr., Ins. inj. veg., 



Amfir. sept., 127, pi. 38. figs. 4, 5 (183.3);— 3d ed., 271(1802). 



Morr., Syn. Lep. N. Amer., 85 (1862). Epidemia epixanthe Scudd., Bull. Buff. 



Chrysophanus epixanthe Westw.-Hewits., soc. uat. sc, iii : 128 (1876). 



Gen. diurii. Lep.. ii: -198 (1852);— Fern., Butt. Polyommatus amicetus Boisd. M.S.; 



Me., 88 (1834);- French, Butt. east. «r. S., Doubl., List Brit, nuis., ii : 55 (1847). 



282-283 (1886);— Mayn., Butt. N. E., 41-42, pi. Figured by Glover, III. N. A. Lep., pi. 23, 



5, figs. 53, 53 a (1886). figs. 14, 15; pi. F, tig. 4, ined. 



Men, like butterflies, 

 Show not their mealy wings but to the summer. 



Shakespeare. — Troilus and Cressida. 



I'll malve one in a dance. 



Shakespeare.— iyOi'e's Labour's Lost. 



Imago (5:5. 7). Head covered with l)lack, mixed with brownish fulvous hairs, 

 the latter especially on the summit; behind the eyes covered with black scales, but 

 next the eye itself a band of white scales, narrow above, broad below; in front and 

 about the antennae exactly as in H. hypophlaeas. Antennae black, the base of each joint 

 of the stalk annulated narrowly (on the outer surface broadly) with white; b.asal half 

 of the under outer surface of club white; beneath dull orange castaneous, the apical 

 two or three joints orange luteous above. Palpi, excepting the apical joint, white, a 

 few black hairs in the otherwise white fringe below, more abundant aplcally, the 

 apical half of the middle joint above, and the apex at the sides black; apical joint 

 black, excepting the white under surface, tipped minutely with white. Tongue black- 

 ish testaceous. 



Thorax covered above with dark yellowish brown hairs, beneath with white hairs. 

 Legs white, the tarsi sometimes dirty white, the apical joint of the tarsi and the basal 

 two-thirds of the other joints, excepting the first, blackish brown above, the tarsal 

 joints brownish yellow below; spines black; claws dark red. 



Wings above : Fore wings ; second superior subcostal nervule arising at three-fifths 



