1818 BUTTERFLIES BEYOND NEW ENGLAND. 



of Chilian butterflies. In the United States it extends from Atlantic to 

 Pacific, but not often north of 35° N. Latitude, though it occurs sparingly 

 and occasionally as far as Pennsylvania and New Jersey on the Atlantic 

 coast. Edwards says that on only two occasions have single specimens been 

 taken in West Virginia. 



There are many broods of this brilliant butterfly in the course of the 

 year. As early as the end of March, Riley found eggs and caterpillars of 

 all stages in southern California, so that it would probably be impossible to 

 determine how many broods occurred in the year, for the caterpillars mature 

 with great rapidity, the later stages being exceptionally brief, so that the 

 whole round from egg to imago was accomplished in twenty-three days 

 in one instance related by Mr. Edwards, and in another in twenty-one 

 days. Dr. Wittfeld also writes me of butterflies appearing July 26, from 

 eggs laid the first of the -month. How the winter is passed is nowhere 

 stated. 



Dr. Wittfeld writes that the eggs are deposited chiefly on the tips of the 

 leaves of the food plant, from one to six or eight being laid on one leaf; 

 even if the leaf tips are already full of the eggs of its ally, Apostraphia chari- 

 thonia, say from five to eighteen of them, Agraulis will lay hers close be- 

 side them ; "in fact Agraulis is very injudicious and will deposit her eggs 

 on dry grass, forty feet away from the food plant." Riley once saw the 

 female laying eggs, which she did, when undisturbed, at the rate of seven 

 eggs a minute ; the eggs hatch in four or five days. 



The caterpillars are very hardy and easy to raise. Dr. Wittfeld tells me ; 

 they feed on Passiflora incarnata in the United States, and other species 

 of Passiflora further south, and when full grown will often tra^'cl great dis- 

 tances to suspend, and then do so on dry sticks, fence rails, etc., fully ex- 

 posed to view. The chrysalis state lasts in several recorded instances as 

 follows : in West Virginia, July 5-12 (Edwards) ; in Georgia, July 9-17 

 (Abbot) ; in Florida, July 18-26 (Wittfeld) ; in Surinam, May 28-June 

 1 (Stoir), six to eight days (Sepp), so that it may hang from four to 

 eight days. 



Dr. Wittfeld says he has seen from six to sixteen butterflies roost with 

 closed wings on one bunch of grass. 



According to Sepp the caterpillars and chrysalids of the two sexes may 

 be distinguished by their color, but probably he judged from insuflficient 

 material, there being considerable individual variation. Dr. Riley observed 

 that the full grown caterpillar he found in California " differed very much 

 in colorational aspect from those which I am familiar with in the east. 

 Instead of being uniformly vinous brown, it was of a beautiful leaden, or 

 pale indigo-blue, with distinct, lateral, white stripes, and the black head 

 was also marked with white ; whereas in my eastern specimens the head is 

 uniformly black." 



