90 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 
here also that for half an hour I sat and watched the strapping 
Chasseurs Alpins of the French Army defile before me—fresh, 
merry, and brisk as are all these mountain infantrymen, even 
with eight hours’ march behind them over these stark moun- 
tains. The little herbage left by the shepherds’ flocks the army 
mules seemed to have finished up; and for quite an hour’s 
walking I encountered practically nothing of note—a few scattered 
Colias phicomone, a very occasional Hrebia epiphron, var. cas- 
siope, and rarer Polyommatus pheretes; even Plebeius argus, the 
ubiquitous, had diminished, and, of course, as soon as I attained 
a ‘not bad eminence,’”’ in went the sun, down came the mist, 
and collecting butterflies in the Lauzanier was over for the day, 
though it was barely one o’clock. So after lunch and a welcome 
foot-washing in the torrent (strongly recommended for weary 
and sore feet), I turned back, seeing nothing more on the wing 
until just past the opposite hamlet of Maison-Méane, where the 
last rays of a belated sun woke ‘into momentary activity a few 
fine male EH. goante. 
Next day being gloriously fine, I set out for the Lac de la 
Madeleine, which lies on the Italian side of the Col de Larche 
(6545 ft.), a few hundred yards across the frontier, and about an 
hour and a half’s easy walking from Larche itself. Quite the 
commonest insect about was Macroglossum stellatarum, and 
wherever the sun touched the little patches of sainfoin and 
lucerne, Colias edusa and C. hyale were chasing one another, 
with P. apollo and the usual common Pierids. But I did not 
come across P. napi, var. bryonie; and I think that, this being a 
single-brooded species in the Alps, it was probably over. Push- 
ing on, I did not unfurl until I had reached the “‘ International 
House,” where the red-white-and-blue and the red-white-and- 
sreen posts upon the roadside denote the meeting of France 
and Italy. The Italian Dogana is somewhat further on by the 
Lake, and the affable Customs officer in command, who 
regarded my net as an excellent piece of fooling, not being able 
to direct me to any mountain path which would bring me back 
into the Lauzanier, I missed no doubt the best collecting 
ground hereabouts. For example, I failed entirely to hit 
the right spot for C. paleno, which I suspect occurs only on 
the Italian slopes, for nowhere could I discover the indispensable 
Vaccinium, upon which, in common with P. optilete, the larva 
feeds. 
Within a few yards of the Lake itself, however, I did come 
across a, to me, new and exceptionally interesting form of Hrebia 
mnestra, this being the variety named by Bellier gorgophone, 
and described by him as a distinct species (Ann. Soc. France, 
1868, pp. 419-420), intermediate between H. gorge of the Alps 
and EH. gorgone of the Pyrenees, but later determined as a 
localized form of mnestra. This variety is apparently so little 
