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LEPIDOPTERA. 



New British Species in 1859. 



(By the Editor.) 



Another hot summer, in immediate succession to the two 

 previous unusually hot summers, has again tended to swell 

 our lists with species usually confined to the South of 

 Europe. 



Yet on the whole we do not hear that the season has been 

 generally a good one for insects; sugaring has rarely been 

 found as profitable as on many a former occasion, and from 

 many parts of the country we have received continual com- 

 plaints of the scarcity of insects. 



The occurrence of a specimen of Polyommat,us Boetica, 

 on the chalk downs in Sussex, has naturally created a con- 

 siderable sensation. We, however, see nothing very alarm- 

 ing in this descent of a foreigner on our own coasts, and we 

 fortunately had an opportunity of anticipating the proba- 

 bility of such an occurrence. A correspondent, located 

 almost within sight of Cherbourg, had written to narrate the 

 appearance in 1859 of a butterfly not seen in Guernsey for 

 about twenty years ; and this insect, which showed a par- 

 tiality for a bed of parsnips, proved to be JPolyommatus 

 Bcetica. Subsequently, a correspondent in Madeira gave 

 the interesting information that the larva feeds in the pods of 



