152 T.EPIDOPTERA. 



by drawing together leavef? of its food-plant, lines it more 

 strongly than usual with silk, and there suspends itself for 

 pupation. 



June, July, and occasionally in September. 



Pupa stout and more rounded than is usual in the Vancsscr. ; 

 head with a pair of short blunt horns or points ; the back of 

 the thorax swelling up into a round curve, with a point at 

 the apex, and falling in at the waist, beyond which the 

 abdomen is rounded up a little and curves away gradually to 

 the tail. On the back of the abdominal segments is a row of 

 blunt knobs and a longer row on each side. Dusky brown 

 tinged with pinkish grey and smoky, or greenish with a 

 golden gloss ; sub-dorsal knobs golden. (Buckler.) 



Peculiar interest attaches to this butterfly from its erratic 

 habits. In some seasons it is plentiful in every clover field, 

 quarry, weedy lane, hillside, and even on the tops of the 

 highest hills, where it particularly loves to sun itself on out- 

 cropping rocks ; in others not a specimen is to be seen any- 

 where. Sometimes, after a summer and autumn in which 

 not one had been noticed before hybernation, nor any in the 

 spring, a hot summer day in June will be signalised by the 

 sudden appearance of multitudes, all along the south coast 

 especially, all in poor condition, but in the highest state of 

 restlessness, frequenting the sunny slopes of the cliffs, 

 settling with extended wings on every dry hot spot, and 

 when disturbed dashing swiftly away, to return almost im- 

 mediately and rest on the hot rock at one's very feet. Very 

 soon these will have scattered over the country, and in a few 

 weeks every large thistle will show the habitations of a larva, 

 from which in a short time will emerge the butterfly, in 

 great beauty and brilliancy, which, with multitudes of its 

 species, will enliven every hillside, cliff, flowery lane, and 

 clover field, and even very often the gardens. At other 

 times the sudden advent of multitudes is later in the season, 

 as in 1879, when hundreds appeared in Pembrokeshire in 

 August, and, indeed, all along the south coast, amounting to 



