Lycmna. ■ 55 



copper band. Expands from i to ij inches. Found in South-Eastern Europe, Italy, and Western 

 and Central Asia from May to July, but not very common. The summer brood has short tails in 

 Syria. The larva feeds on Spartiuiii scopariuiii. 



4. L. AlcipJiron (Rott.). — Wings above spotted with black; male copper, strongly suftused with 

 blue ; female dark brown, with a marginal copper band, which is often bordered with blue in front. 

 Under side of the fore-wings pale copper, with the principal row of eyes arranged in pairs, and 

 generally with only one row of black marginal spots; hind-wings ashy-grey, with a marginal copper 

 band. The variety Gordiiis (Sulz.) is coppery in both sexes; the male strongly tinged with blue at 

 the base, and the black spots are much larger and more conspicuous. Expands from i ^ to 1 1 

 inches. Found in damp meadows in Eastern and Southern Europe, and in Western Asia, in June 

 and July ; the variety Gordius is met with only south of the Alps. The larva is dull green, with 

 brown lines on the back and sides ; head brown. Feeds on sorrel from April to June. 



*S. L. Hippotlwe (Linn.), Eitrydice (Rott.), Chryscis (Ochs.), {Purple-edged Copper). — Male bright 

 copper-red, with a black spot at the end of the discoidal cell of the fore -wings ; the margins rather 

 broadly brown, and suffused with purple. The female is dark brown, tinged with copper on the fore- 

 wings, and spotted with black ; hind-wings with a copper band, spotted outside with black. Under 

 side of fore-wings coppery, with ashy-grey margins, and with an irregular row of eyes, not arranged 

 in pairs, and a single row of marginal spots ; hind-wings ashy-grey, with a marginal copper band. 

 The Alpine variety Eicrybia (Ochs.) is smaller, the male paler, and with the margins scarcely tinged 

 with purple ; the female is almost uniform brown, very faintly suffused with copper, and the under 

 side is uniform brownish-grey, the fore-wings slightly tinged with copper in the female. Expands 

 from I to \\ inches. Common throughout a great part of Europe and Western Asia from June to 

 August, though somewhat local, frequenting damp meadows near woods and in the mountains. It 

 appears to have formerly inhabited the south of England, but is probably now extinct. Epping 

 Forest, and Ashdown Forest in Sussex, are mentioned as its localities. The former is very 

 doubtful; and the latter, though said to have produced many rarities in former times, has been little 

 visited lately by entomologists. I have also seen a pair in the collection of the late Mr. T. Marshall, 

 of Leicester, who told me that he picked them out of a quantity of L. Dispar received from 

 Cambridgeshire at a time when the latter insect was selling for threepence a specimen ; and I 

 therefore see no reason to doubt the British origin of the specimens of Hippotlioe also. The larva 

 is green, with whitish incisions, and a brown head. There is a dark line on the back and two 

 white lines on the sides. The male butterfly is figured at PI. 14, Fig. 12. 



*6. L. Dispar (Haw.), [Large Copper) . — Male brilliant copper, with rather narrow black borders, 

 and two spots in the discoidal cell of the fore-wings ; female with the fore-wings copper, with three 

 discoidal spots, and an outer row of large black spots; hind-wings dark brown, with black spots, and 

 a submarginal copper band. Under side of fore-wings copper; hind-wings, except the marginal 

 copper band and the hind margin of the fore-wings, bluish-grey. The variety Rutilus (Werneb.), 

 Plippotlioe (Hiibn.), {Dark Uuder-tvinged Copper), is smaller and duller-coloured, with much smaller 

 spots, and only two discoidal spots in the female and one in the male, and the under side is ashy- 

 grey rather than bluish. Expands from i^ to 2 inches. L. Dispar wd^s formerly abundant in the 

 fens of the south-eastern counties of England, but has not been seen alive for the last quarter of a 

 century, and is believed to have become quite extinct in consequence of the draining of the fens. 

 The variety Rutilus, which has been reputed British on insufficient authority, is a very local insect 

 in Central Europe. In Eastern Europe and Northern and Western Asia it appears to be commoner. 

 It is found in damp meadows from June to August. I have an indistinct recollection of having 

 heard or read, many years ago, that the true Z?/jr/<rr was found in Nubia; but I have never since been 



