PSYCHE. 



ORGAN OF THE CAMBRIDGE ENTOMOLOGICAL CLUB 



EDITED BY B. PICKMAN MANN. 

 Vol. I.] Cambridge, Mass., December, 1875. [No. 20. 



On an Immense Flight of Small Butterflies (Terias lisa) 

 in the Bermudas. 



Marvellous indeed, as naturalists well know, are those peri- 

 odic movements of the feathered race known as spring and 

 autumn migrations. Moved by an instinctive impulse implanted 

 in them by the Creator, thousands upon thousands of birds of 

 all sizes, from the bulky swan to the tiny humming bird, travel 

 by sea or land to distances so remote that, unless it was ascer- 

 tained beyond doubt that the space was traversed, the fact 

 would be considered almost incredible. 



But if we are greatly astonished at the power of endurance 

 exemplified in this long sustained flight of some of the smallest 

 birds, what will be said when we relate a circumstance con- 

 nected with a similar power possessed by a species of butterfly, 

 so small and apparently incapable of withstanding the violence 

 of the elements, that we know not which is the more remark- 

 able, the distance traversed, or the number of these frail little 

 creatures which lived to reach those remote isles of the ocean, 

 after an aerial journey of some six hundred miles or more ? 



Thus it was. Early in the morning of the first day of Oct. 

 last year (1874), several persons living on the north side of 

 the main island perceived, as they thought, a cloud coming 

 over from the north west, which drew nearer and nearer to the 

 shore, on reaching which it divided into two parts, one of which 

 went eastward, and the other westward, gradually falling upon 

 the land. They were not long in ascertaining that what they 

 had taken for a cloud was an immense concourse of small yel- 

 low butterflies {Terias lisa Boisd.), which flitted about all the 

 open grassy patches and cultivated grounds in a lazy manner, 

 as if fatigued after their long voyage over the deep. Fisher- 



