INTRODUCTION. 



The difficulty I experienced, when beginning to collect buttei-flies 

 in Switzerland, in finding out what to look for, and when and where 

 to look, and the discovery that many others were in the same situa- 

 tion, tirst opened my eyes to the necessity for a book with some such 

 scope as the present. No work dealing with the Swiss butterflies as 

 a whole had appeared since Frey's " Lepidopteren der Schweiz " in 

 IHHO, though Lang's " Butterflies of Europe " was published in 1884, 

 and 1885 saw the production of the "European JUitterfiies " of Kane, 

 who has become the " guide, philosopher and friend" of a large and 

 ever-inci-easing number of British lepidopterists in the Alps and 

 elsewhere. Moreover, not only had new species been discovered since 

 that time, but one of the books was in German, another decidedly 

 expensive and not very portable, and the third, 1 was informed on trying 

 to obtain a copy, sold out ; and in neither of them was the subject of 

 variation, so intensely interesting even to the " mere collector," more 

 than lightly touched on. It was not, however, until much later that 

 I even contemplaied the possibility of trying to supply the deficiency, 

 an idea which was first suggested to me after the publication of some 

 of my papers in the Knt(»ii(il(iijisf\ lltrord, when I found, to my own 

 great surprise, that my advice was asked, and my opinion consulted, 

 by entire strangers, even including, during the last two years, some of 

 the best known lepidopterists of Switzerland. This circumstance, 

 together with the fact that no one else seemed willing to throw himself 

 into the breach, must be my excuse for undertaking the task ; and, if 

 it be a case of " where angels fear to tread," I can only plead that at 

 least I have not " nis/wd in." Often the inclusion, or even the sup- 

 pression, of a single line has entailed the close examination of many 

 specimens, and a most unexpected amount of correspondence. 



The original idea was to include Swiss butterflies only, but 

 Switzerland is so entirely a political rather than a geographical ex- 

 pression, that it seemed necessary either to enlarge or diminish the 

 scope of the Avork, and, after much consideration, the whole of the Alps 

 of Central Europe have been included ; i.e., the Alpes-Maritimes, the 

 Hautes and Basses Alpes, and Savoie in France : the Alps of N. Italy ; 

 the Tyrol ; the Styrian, Carinthian and .Tulian Alps, and such small 

 portions of the S. of Upper and Lower Austria as are alpine. At the 

 same time the original idea has not been lost sight of ; the whole of 

 Switzerland is included whether alpine or not (which has involved the 

 inclusion of the French Jura), anu those species and varieties which 

 have never been taken in Switzerland are marked with an asterisk ('•'), 

 for the convenience of those collectors (no insignificant number) who 

 confine their attentions exclusively to the l)utterflies of that country. 

 It will also, no doubt, be at once perceived that the localities given 

 outside Switzerland are both fewer and often less precise than those 

 within it, especially with regard to the more eastern portion of the 

 region ; and I must at once admit that I feel myself far less well 

 ecjuipped for dealing with the latter portion of the subject, both from 



