73 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



ENTOMOLOGICAL NOTES, CAPTURES, &c. 



Late appearance of Gonopteryx rhamni. — Referring to the late 

 appearance of insects last year tiie following note may be of interest : — " Ou 

 Sunday, October 28tli, on the common near here, a male specimen of the 

 above insect was taken in good condition having apparently only recently 

 emerged. The day was bright and warm. — A. Druitt ; Chapel Street, 

 Berkhampsted. [This species lias been noted flying on warm days in the 

 South of England at a later period than that above given. — Ed.] 



Anthocharis cardamines AJiD Vanessa urtic^ (vars.). — I have 

 received from Thame (Oxfordshire) a female A. cardamines, with an orange 

 splash on the left fore wing. A similar marking also occurs ou the right 

 upper wing, but only on the under side. The V. urtic<£ was l)red with a 

 large number of others. It is similar to the fourth figure in Newman's. 

 The specimens were taken and bred respectively by a lady, who was struck 

 by their abnormal appearance. — Alfred T. Mitchell; 5, Clayton Ter- 

 race, Gunnerslury, W,, January V2, 1889. 



Varieties of Colias elusa. — In reply to Mr. T. D. A. Cockerell's 

 note (Entom. 13) with reference to my notice of the capture of a "primrose 

 coloured" Colias edusa, var. helice (Entom. xxi, 27'2), I would say that by 

 this description I did not at all mean to suggest that the specimen is as 

 yellow as our own Colias hyale, or the North American Colias philodice ; 

 but I think I may safely describe it as being in tint mid-way between these 

 species, and the European Colias phicomone. It is often exceedingly 

 difficult to give an accurate name to shades of colour, perhaps the defini- 

 tion of this as " light straw " would be preferable. Besides there are 

 primroses and primroses, and when I wrote I had not in my eye the 

 " yellow primrose " of the poet " by the river's brim," newly expanded, but 

 one full-blown and somewhat bleached by exposure to sun and weatber. In 

 the season of 1877, when Colias edusa was so extraordinarily abundant in 

 this country, it was my fortune to set more than fifty of the variety helice, 

 of Ha worth, taken here. For the sake of convenience in speaking of them 

 to ray friends, I roughly divided them into "white," or "primrose 

 coloured ;" but in fact they present a variety of tints, from the typical 

 greenish white, through light straw, to dark cream colour. I have, more- 

 over, a so-called " intermediate" variety of the female, between edusa and 

 helice, of a peculiar buf5, with the marginal spots whiter than in the usual 

 form. There is a male specimen of edtisa in my drawer, which always 

 attracts attention from the glowing rosy violet of the hind wings — quite as 

 shining as Apatura iris, but altogether of a different colour, this being very 

 rosy. A male edusa, with a tinge of this lovely tint in the hind wings, was 

 taken by Mr. F. Purchase here in September last. It is, however, not 

 nearly so beautiful as my own. — Joseph Anderson, jun., Chichester. 



Vanessa c-album in Febrqary. — On February 3rd this year I 

 caught a damaged specimen of this rare insect on the borders of some 

 woods near the Tichborne estate. While on wing it appeared to be nothing 

 more than a mutilated V. urtica, and my only reason for attempting 

 its capture was on account of curiosity at such Icarian behaviour. Although 

 the morning was bright enough, the weather was not such that we might 



