270 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



On the morning of May 12th I visited the Promontor 

 Marshes with Professor Schmidt, chiefly with the view of ob- 

 taining a series of Chrysophanus thersamon. It was a very 

 pleasant experience — after last year's June visits to these 

 marshes, which resulted in a few battered specimens only — to 

 net in a short hour twenty-three fine examples, the sexes being 

 about equally represented ; a solitary C. rutilus male seemed 

 about the first emergence of his generation. I was fortunate to 

 add a not very good male Colias chrysotheme to my list, the first 

 time I had seen this species ; Pajnlio machaon was frequent, 

 with at least one var. aurantiaca ; plenty of Pontia daplidice var. 

 bellidice ; some Chrysophanus dorilis ; and a few Melitcea cinxia 

 completed my list of species other than those of universal 

 distribution. 



Proceeding towards the lower reaches of the Danube, the 

 train stopped for half an hour some twenty miles north of 

 Temesvar, and enabled me, in not a very happy frame of mind, 

 to watch the gambols of a pair of Colias myrmidione on the 

 railway bank, in apparently perfect condition, for I had searched 

 for this species long, and so far unsuccessfully, and to see it for 

 the first time under these conditions was distinctly tantalizing. 



That portion of the Danube gorge between Bazias and 

 Orsova impressed me as being good ground, with plenty of well- 

 wooded transverse ravines, and one passes several villages on 

 the Hungarian side of the river where accommodation might be 

 obtained. 



I reached Herculesbad on May 18th, and was favoured with 

 four practically cloudless days. It has often impressed me that 

 one of the most charming aspects of the study of European 

 butterflies is that it almost invariably takes one into such 

 exquisite surroundings ; and that the best localities for butter- 

 flies are usually those of the greatest scenic beauty. Albarracin, 

 Berisal, Zermatt, Eonda, Granada, and the " Cote d'Azur," 

 amongst others, each in its way are amongst the fairest spots 

 in Europe ; and they have all produced for me, at different 

 times, shoals of butterflies, many interesting and beautiful 

 species hardly to be met with elsewhere. 



Herculesbad can take its place wdth any of these, and just 

 at the period of my visit it was looking its very best. The 

 luxuriant woods clothing the sides of the great gorge, except 

 where these are sheer rock and precipice, were in the vivid and 

 varied green of late spring, and the air was laden with the 

 perfume of blossom of tree, shrub, and plant. Prominent 

 amongst these was the wild lilac ; these regions are the home 

 of that exquisite shrub, and the mountains round, when the 

 woods are not too dense, are thickly overgrown with it. Another 

 noticeable tree was a species of ash with large trusses of 

 odorous cream-coloured flowers, and one tree was sufficient to 



