282 Mr. H. J. Elwes on 



21. Argyro])horvs arycnteus. 



A. argcnteus, Blanchard, Fauna Chil, vii, p. 30, 

 Chionohas argeoitetts, id., t. c, PI. II, figs. 9-11. 



This is one of the most beautiful and unique butterflies 

 in Chile, or I may say in the world, and as its habits are 

 undescribed I will give an account of them, as I had ample 

 opportunities of observing it. Though found at various 

 places in the mountains it seems local. Mr. Calvert has 

 taken it on the Campana Mountain near Quillota, and 

 Edmonds says he took it near La Union in the province 

 of Valdivia, but at what elevation he does not mention. 

 I first found it in the Villacura Valley east of the Pemehue 

 range at the end of January, where it Avas abundant at 

 about 3000 feet on grassy hillsides and flats covered with 

 long tufted herbage. In the morning when it first begins 

 to move, and before the wind has become strong, it may be 

 taken without much diflficulty, though even then it is very 

 shy. Later it flies in the sun with such rapidity that it is 

 only by waiting in the line of flight that you can take them. 

 The brilliance of the shining silvery mngs of this butterfly 

 make it a most beautiful and striking object when fresh, 

 but they soon become worn and broken, and a very large 

 proportion of those I took were not worth keeping. All 

 along the upper valley of the Biobio and on the Argentine 

 side of the frontier about Lake Alumine I found it common 

 up to about 4000 feet, always on the grassy hill-sides but 

 never in the forest. It settles on the ground amongst tufts 

 of grass, and the larva is no doubt a grass-feeder. It was 

 common about San Martin and as far south as the valley 

 of the Limay, and when I re-crossed the Andes at the end 

 of February I saw one or two in the Aconcagua Valley 

 at about 6000 feet elevation, 



22, Faumda stelligera. (Plate XV, figs. 1 ^, 2 $.) 



F. stelligera, Butler, Trans. Ent. Soc. Lond., 1881, 

 p. 460, PI. XXI, fig. 10. 

 I found this species commoa on the grassy hill-sides and 

 ridges above timber-line near the Baiios de Chilian at 

 6000 to 7000 feet in December, when many specimens 

 were already worn. The flight and habits are essentially 

 like those of the Alpine grass Erebias, and as it never 

 occurs far from the dwarfed form of " colihue " (a bamboo- 

 grass very like the Arundinarias of the Himalayas) which 

 covers large areas of these mountain-sides, I have little 



