OF OLD AND NEW WORLD 211 



miglit at first lead us to suppose that the life of 

 the genus may have been the longer in Europe. 

 This is the fact that in the Alps of Switzerland 

 there is a species very clearly distinct from any 

 found in the north, while on our own high moun- 

 tain-tops the White Mountain butterfly (O. semi- 

 dea) is considered by many writers as identical 

 with a species found in Labrador. But both are 

 waifs left by the glacial epoch. Still, the bulk of 

 genera to which the satyrids of Europe are referred 

 belong to the section with ribbed eggs, in which 

 Oeneis falls, while the contrary is true of the 

 American forms. It would seem, therefore, as 

 probable (though highly uncertain) that Oeneis 

 originated in the Old World. 



All the other species, in the opinion of most 

 critical entomologists, are different from those of 

 the Old World, but in all cases they approach so 

 closely to them that many writers have considered 

 them as identical. The Green Comma (Polygonia 

 faunus) is a case in point. It has been considered 

 as identical with one of the forms of the variable 

 Comma butterfly (Polygonia c.-album) of Europe; 

 but the facts in the case would seem to show that, 

 whereas the species of the Old World are few 

 and variable, those of the New are numerous and 



