IIESPEKIDI: TIIANAOS PERSIUS. 1475 



when they were placed for the winter in a cold-storage chamber and not re- 

 leased until May 10. All were found still caterpillars and still active. As 

 before, they resisted all attempts at inspection, so that I can only say that 

 half of them were chrysalids, half larvae, on Mav 27 and that the fii'st one 

 emerged from the chrysalis on June 13, just at its proper season, after at 

 least sixteen days in the chrysalis. 



Habits of the butterfly. The butterfly is fond of alighting on wet 

 sand and may most frecjucntly be foimd by shadv roadsides near woods, 

 seeming to frequent the vicinity of hazel. It is fond of flowers and Dr. 

 Asa Gray once showed me a specimen having the pollinia of Platanthera 

 hookeri attached one to each of its eyes — the only naked parts of the body 

 whore they would stick, unless it were the tongue. It flies with a strong, 

 rapid movement especially when disturbed and seldom passes from one spot 

 to an adjacent one without describing several irregular, rapid circles ; at 

 such a time it rarely rises more then too or three inches above the ground ; 

 just before alighting, the wings have a quivering motion. It is an uneasy 

 insect, difiicult to suit ; no sooner alighted on a choice bit of moist, shady 

 ground than off it starts again, and, in alarm, shows the greatest uneasiness. 



It usually rests on the gx-oundwith the wings fully expanded, touching 

 the earth behind but considerably elevated in front ; when sipping the 

 moisture from the surface, the antennae droop at an angle of about 30° with 

 the body. When it alights on a twig, the wings are generally placed at 

 about right angles with each other and the antennae then diverge an angle 

 of about 110° ; but its wings are soon fully expanded, as on the ground, and 

 then the antennae approach until at about right angles with each other. 

 One may sometimes see them alight with expanded wings in the bright sun, 

 and then as if it were too hot for them, raise all of them equally till they 

 are edgewise to the sun or with the slightest possible divergence, the fore 

 wings dropped a little so that the costal margin is entirely vertical. 



Parasites. One of the caterpillars which I carried through the winter 

 in a cold-storage warehouse and which actively closed every opening to 

 its nest as fast as one was opened, finally succumbed to a hymenopterous 

 parasite which had been preying upon its vitals during all these vexatious 

 proceedings. On June 20, after hibernation, I discovered within the nest 

 a pale, greenish yellow maggot which had just left the side of the cater- 

 pillar and was squirming about. It was about 7 mm. long ; three days 

 later it had changed to a pale lemon yellow pupa and was lying in a 

 curved position in the box in which I had placed it ; later it escaped and 

 so could not be determined ; it was in the pupa state ten days or less. 



Desiderata. Our knowledge of the distribution of this insect in the 

 interior of the continent is very inadequate, as the statistics given readily 

 show. The most perplexing thing about its life history is the apparent 

 occasional appearance of a second brood in the north ; we know nothing 



