L YCMNID^. 99 



Mr. C. A. Briggs tells me that it was still to be found there 

 iu 1859, and that Archdeacon Bree was well acquainted with 

 various localities in that district in which it had not been 

 hunted down — as it certainly had been at Barnwell Wold — 

 but that the terribly wet season of 1860 appears to have 

 exterminated it all through that district, it not having been 

 seen there since. A more recently discovered locality was on 

 the Cotswold Hills in Gloucestershire, where it was taken in 

 some numbers by the Gloucester entomologists. Mr. Herbert 

 Goss also tells, in the Eiitomolofji>it'.t Montlily Mnriazine, how he 

 made its acquaintance there in 1876, first in an old disused 

 (juarry, afterwards in the open glades of an extensive beech 

 wood, where was an abundance of flowers, wild thyme 

 especially, and where arion was comparatively common. 

 He says that there was no probability of mistaking it for 

 any other species, its larger size, dark iron-blue colour, and 

 somewhat heavy wobbling flight sufficiently distinguishing it. 

 Also that it naturally flies more in the manner of Epivcpliilc 

 Tithonus or luipcranthus than in that of its congeners, but 

 when pursued or frightened, is sufficiently strong on the 

 wing. Very fond of resting upon, and extracting honey 

 from, the blossoms of wild thyme. In 1877 Mr. Goss again 

 found it commonly, but in 1883 not a specimen could be met 

 with in twelve days' search, and the species was then supposed 

 to have been exterminated in the Cotswold district — it was 

 suggested, by the farmers, who make a practice of burning 

 the dead grass on the hills in the early spring ; but ^Ir, Goss 

 points out that this practice of burning dead grass has 

 obtained from time immemorial, and can hardly be the sole 

 cause of its destruction. Moreover the butterfly was again 

 found by him in the same district in very small numbers at 

 the end of June 1890, and should not yet be despaired of. 

 Mr. Herbert Marsden contributed some interesting notes 

 upon it in this locality in the same periodical for 1884, 

 showing how great was the fluctuation in numbers, according 

 to the weather. In 1868 and 1869. in fine seasons, it increased 



