186 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



NOTES AND OBSEEVATIONS. 



The Hibernation and Spring Emergence of Pyrameis 

 ATALANTA. — I think it has been demonstrated beyond doubt that a 

 part of the autumn larvae of this butterfly pupate and successfully 

 withstand the rigours, or rather humours, of the English winter. 

 If further evidence of the occasional survival be required, I think 

 the following recent observations may be of interest. On Sunday, 

 July 1st, in the grounds of Grims Dyke, Harrow Weald, I watched 

 an extremely battered example of atalanta sunning herself on a 

 hop vine. On the 8th, in a field near Pinner and Hatch End 

 Station, I saw another example in excellent condition as to wing- 

 structure, but with colours dimmed. The first may have been a 

 migrant ; the second, in my opinion, was in altogether too good a 

 condition to have crossed the Channel after the continental spring 

 emergence and migration ; and it certainly was not one of a precocious 

 summer emergence on this side. Whether it is to be an atalanta 

 year remains to be seen. But, as far as Vanessa io is concerned, I 

 noticed on a visit to the Chilterns that the nettle-beds swarming 

 with larvae at this season during the past two years were bare 

 entirely of larvae. Eor all the other habitual butterflies, both of 

 Middlesex and the Bucks. Chilterns, the spring emergences have 

 been unusually abundant, in the latter locality especially, with 

 Gupido minimus, which generally appears by " single spies," but 

 this year " in battalions." Nisoniades tages even took a fancy to 

 some purple cranesbill in the garden here — a rara avis indeed. — 

 H. Rowland-Brown ; Harrow Weald, July 11th, 1917. 



Agriades thersites, Cantener, in Normandy. — Towards the 

 end of June I I'eceived from my friend. Prof. L. Dupont, half a dozen 

 examples of Agriades thersites, captured by him June 9th-16th, in 

 the neighbourhood of Evreux, Eure. This capture is of great interest, 

 as it adds considerably to the known northern area of distribution 

 of a species in France not hitherto reported, I think, north of Paris 

 in this direction, though it is enumerated among the Lycasnids of 

 Belgium by Mr. F. I. Ball, an Anglo-Belgian lepidopterist. M. 

 Dupont pronounces it as occurring not uncommonly on the sainfoin 

 meadows of his immediate locality, which has produced not a few 

 butterflies usually associated with far more southern areas, such as 

 Hijyparchia briseis and H. aretJmsa ; for Evreux is about seventy 

 miles north-west of Paris and forty-three due south of Rouen. I 

 need hardly remind our readers that this is the butterfly of which 

 Dr. T. A. Chapman has made an exhaustive study [" An unrecognised 

 European Lycaena, identified as Agriades thersites (Bois. MSS.), 

 Cantener," 'Trans. Ent. Soc.,' 1912, pp. 662-676; and " A Contri- 

 bution to the Life-history of Agriades thersites, Cantener," loc. cit., 

 1914, pp. 288-308). Dr. Chapman tells us how he identified his 

 subject with Cantener's figure, published in 1834 with the remark 

 (' Hist. Nat. des Lipids . . . des D6partemens des Haut et 

 Bas-Rhin,' etc., p. 55, note [1]): "The individual figured is the 

 veritable thersites, Boisd. (collection) . . . occurring as commonly 

 in the south of France as Alexis."] Thus, eighty-three years since, 



