21 



BUTTERFLIES OF CANTAL AND LOZERE. 

 By H. Rowland-Brown, M.A., F.E.S. 



A correction of mine made in revising this paper for press 

 (vol. xlii. p. 297) was, by some oversight, not inchided. In the 

 footnote descriptive of the ab. escherinus it should have been 

 stated that this form of Polyommatus escheri, taken by me at 

 Mende (the male) and at St. Martin-Vesubie (the female), 

 apj)eared to be transitional to the ab. suhtus-impunctata, Oberth. 

 C Etudes de la Variation chez les Lepidopteres,' livr. xxme., pi. 

 iii. fig. 25). In this form from Barcelona, the whole of the under 

 side black markings have disappeared, and I expect that it is the 

 example " depourvu en dessous des points ocelles " exhibited 

 before the Entomological Society of France, December 9, 1863 

 (Bull. Ent. Soc. Fr. 1863, Hi.). I may add that M. Charles 

 Oberthur {op. cit. pi. iii. fig. 39) figures the form of P. eros, 

 included in my illustration, as ab. stibtus-radiata. 



Chrysophanus alciphron, var. gordius, ab. $ midas, Lowe. 

 — I wish also to say that my friend the Rev. F. E. Lowe, the 

 original author of this aberration, has written to me pointing 

 out that in a previous paper of mine, where an under side 

 aberration of the species is described, which also corresponds 

 with the ab. escherinus taken at Mende, I have fallen into an 

 error ; the ab. midas being an aberrational form of the upper 

 and not of the under side. On reference to the Rev. G. Wheeler's 

 'Butterflies in Switzerland' (p. 16) I find this to be the case; 

 and, to put the matter straight, I cannot do better than quote the 

 communication which Mr. Lowe has been good enough to make 

 to me. He writes : — 



" Mr. Rowland-Brown describing an entomological visit to 

 ' The Basses-x\lpes in August ' (Entom. xli. p. 262) describes an 

 interesting aberration of the under side of C. alciphron var. 

 gordius, comparing it with the ab. cinnus of P. bellargus. On 

 p. 296 he says : ' This ab. appears in every respect to correspond 

 with ab. female midas, Lowe.' From which it is evident that 

 from a chance misreading he has got a mistaken idea of this 

 aberration. As the same mistake occurs again in * Butterflies 

 of Cantal and Lozere ' {ante, vol. xlii. p. 300), it seems better to 

 correct it lest it should become stereotyped. 



'* Ab. midas is not an aberration of the under side of gordius, 

 but of the upper. Its peculiarities consist in the entire absence 

 of black spots on the upper side of the primaries with the 

 exception of the two large discoidal spots. The black border 

 is very broad and entire until just before the anal angle, when 

 it opens out and makes one large blotch. The hind wings have 

 the disc clear with the exception of a black discoidal spot. The 

 ante -marginal band, which usually in gordius consists of two or 



