FOOD-PLANT OF LYCENA (LATIORINA) ORBITULUS. 221 
a male approaching, flying slowly towards you over the long grass, 
do not be in a hurry to effect a capture, but watch, and as 
it passes you will see the sparkling gem-like, red gold, upper 
side, mingle with the delicate blue-grey under side, and form a 
natural kaleidoscope, a dream of colour well-nigh incomparable. 
Certain other species of Kuropean ‘‘ coppers” are brilliant and 
most beautiful, but there is something indescribable about C. dis- 
par that, to my mind, places it in a class by itself for beauty. 
The female is, of course, not so brilliant an object. She is 
generally to be found in some corner away from the usual haunts 
of the male, presumably after impregnation: one frequently 
observes her at rest during the morning, or she may be disturbed 
out of the herbage. During the afternoon she is usually seen flying 
slowly and steadily over the grass in search of the food-plant. 
One gets the impression that C. var. rutilus is only here for 
a time, for the whole of the herbage is cut for forage every 
season when the young larve of the first brood are feeding, and 
it is difficult to understand how any large proportion can reach 
maturity. Some of the examples I captured were very small, 
one expanding only 28 mm., evidently the result of insufficient 
nutrition. 
The melodious fluting of the golden oriole, and the unmis- 
takable ‘‘ Hoo, hoo, hoo,’’ of the hoopoe, two of our rarest and 
most beautiful birds, now alas, like the large ‘‘ copper,” extinct 
with us, or visiting us only ec isually, added greatly to the interest 
and charm of a red-letter day in one’s entomological life. 
August 19th, 1909. 
THE FOOD-PLANT OF LYC4iNA (LATIORINA) 
ORBITULUS. 
By T. A. Coapman, M.D. 
Wuen | made the observations recorded in the ‘ Kntomo- 
logist’ for last May on this subject, I felt much doubt as to 
whether Androsace vitaliana was the food-plant of L. orbitulus. 
Although it was unquestionably the food-plant at Binn, it might 
be, after all, only a food-plant, one amongst others. This doubt 
was based on the fact that my memories of the various places in 
which I had met with orbitulus were unaccompanied, as a rule, 
with any recollection of Androsace vitaliana. This plant is,how- 
ever, very inconsvicuous, except when in flower, and as orbitulus 
flies after the flowering is over, it seemed quite possible that the 
A. vitaliana was really the food-plant. 
Memory is not very trustworthy on a negative point like 
this, so that my doubts were not clear enough to justify me in 
expressing them when I wrote out the notes referred to. I, 
