PAPILIONINAK : JASONIADES GLAUCUS. 1295 



Geddes, that is, on tlic same paiulkl as tlie limit of tiic species on tlie 

 Atlantic coast. In California it has not been reported to my knowledge. 



In New Enj^land tliis butterfly is everywhere common from the summit 

 of Mount Washington to Long Island Sound, but it is more abimdant in 

 the nortlicrn tiiaii in the southern districts. Mr. Hill has also taken it on 

 the sunmiits of the highest Adirondack Mountains of New York. The 

 dark form is totally unknown in New EnEfland. 



Abundance and haunts. In its season it is in many places one of the 

 commonest of butterflies ; it appears to swarm in mountain valleys. Mr. 

 Doubleday says that in the south it is nowhere rare, inhabiting alike the 

 low sea board and the loftiest of the wooded Alleghanies 3-4000 feet 

 above tlie sea ; according to the same writer the buttei-flies seek the plane tree 

 blossoms, Platanus occidentalis Linn, as well as those of the yellow this- 

 tle, Cnicus horridulusPursh, the banana, Musa sapientum, and the button 

 bush. Cephalanthus occidentalis Linn. Edwards says that in West Vir- 

 ginia the earliest butterflies 



frequent the fruit trees then in bloom. . . , peach, apple, and above all the wild plum. 

 L.ater in the season, [they] abound on the red clover, then on the Asclepiadesand this- 

 tles, and tinally. at the close of the season, on the iron-weed, Vernonia. In the garden 

 they delight in the lilacs, phloxes and zinnias. Another plant, Catananche bicolor 

 with its tall mullein-like flower stalks. Is also very attractive (Butt. N. A., ii). 



In the north, the lilac, Syringa vulgaris, is their particular favorite. 

 "In the early part of a Canadian summer," says D'Urban (Can. nat., ii : 

 225), "when the fragrant lilacs are in full bloom, it is a glorious sight to 

 see the tiny hummingbirds flying over the blossoms in company with this 

 splendid buttei-fly, which is very partial to the flowers of that plant." 

 Elsewhere in the same journal he says that "this splendid buttei-fly fre- 

 quently assembles in great numbers about wounds on the roots of trees 

 from which sap exudes." 



Although generally abundant, there are certain years when they become 

 scarce ; thus, Mr. Lintner noticed in Schoharie, N. Y. that not one specimen 

 was seen in 1856 ; in 1857 they were often seen on damp earth in companies 

 of ten or twelve, while in 1858 they were among the commonest of but- 

 buttei-flies. So Mr. Edwards reports that early in June, 1877, while riding 

 beside a creek he noticed a flat rock studded with swallow-tail butterflies, 

 "as thick as they could stand over a space not less than four feet square" ; 

 nine-tenths of them were of this species; "when they rose it was like a 

 cloud," and according to his computation "there were upward of 2300 

 butterflies in that mass." The next year he "saw scarcely half a dozen 

 examples." 



As this last reference shows, the butterfly is very fond of assembling in 

 companies around spots of moist earth or on the edge of pools by the road- 

 side after a rain. Gosse once saw fifteen in a space not exceeding a foot 



