16 THE GENERA AND SPECIES OF BRITISH BUTTERFLIES. 
phila Livornica and Cherocampa Celerio, as well as many other lepidopterous insects, occasionally 
taken in the British Islands, and placed in our entomological cabinets as British. This species 
of Erebiau may he at once recognised by the collector lucky enough to meet with it, by the deep 
white fringe, interrupted by brown, at the juncture of the nervures ; the frge in all the other 
reputed British species being brown. The male (No. 6) is smaller than the female, and has the 
circlets on the upper side of the anterior wings less distinct, and without the central specks cf 
white. <A single pair of Erebia Ligea are the only specimens in the collection in the British 
Museum. It is said to be a Swedish insect, and if so, the specimens taken in Arran may pos- 
sibly have been wanderers from that country. The Caterpillar is figured at No. 7. 
Ercbia Blandina (the Scotch Argus). The specimen figured at No. 8 is a female, having the 
orange marks, and the circlets with white centres more distinct than in the males, as shown in 
the representation of the male specimen at No. 9. The fringe is brown, like the general upper 
surface of the wings, but rather paler in the female. In the figure No. 9 the colouring of the 
under side is shown, which varies in the sexes, and also to some extent in different specimens ; 
but it is always without the distinct white mark which distinguishes the last-described species. 
The Caterpillar is described as light green, with brown and white longitudinal stripes, but no 
trustworthy representation has yet been published. In Mr. R. F. Logan’s forthcoming “ Illus- 
trations of Scottish Lepidoptera,” however, we shall probably be made acquainted with the 
details of the transformation of this and many other of the rarer species of British Lepidoptera 
occurring only in the North. In England it has been taken in some profusion in the magnesian 
limestone districts near Newcastle, in the neighbourhood of Kendal, and at Colne, and also at 
Wharfdale in Yorkshire, and a few other places. In Scotland it is found in the Isle of Arran 
and several other localities ; and occurs more especially, in some abundance, over a district of 
considerable extent in Dumfries-shire. Varieties occur in this species, both as to the distinctness 
and number of the ocelli. 
Erebia Cassiope (the Small Ringlet, Nos. 10 and 11). This pretty species differs consider- 
ably from the two preceding, not only in size, but in the elongated proportion of the wings, and 
in the absence of denticulation in the fringed edge of the hinder pair. It also differs in the 
markings of the under side, which are of a similar colour to those of the upper surface, and with- 
out any of the gray tones which distinguish the two larger species. It has been taken at various 
places in the mountainous parts of Westmoreland and Cumberland ; the males appearing about 
the middle of June, the females not till somewhat later. It must always be sought at a con- 
siderable elevation on the mountain sides, and generally in damp and grassy recesses. In Scot- 
land it is found in many parts of the Southern counties, and as far North as Rannock in Perth- 
shire ; and probably, if well sought for, even to the most Northern extremities of the Highlands, 
in favourable situations. 
Only three species of this interesting genus are at present admitted into the English lists, 
but others doubtless exist, and will be discovered by enterprising explorers among the mountains 
of Wales or Wicklow, or many of the Scottish ranges, as yet not half explored. On the Conti- 
nent, in precisely similar situations, eighteen or twenty species are found, and few of them are 
especially rare. I think I counted full that number in the collection of the late lamented M. 
Pierret. In the various mountain districts between Grenoble and Mont Cenis, which I made 
the scene of a summer ramble a few summers ago, the dark rich brown of many species of this 
pretty family of Butterflies quite tinted the green slopes of that Alpine region with various 
tones of brown ; which, however, disappeared almost instantly whenever a passing cloud obscured 
the sun, every insect settling among the grass, and becoming invisible till another gleam of sun- 
light brought them out again. I collected many species and varieties, but having no entomolo- 
logical apparatus with me, my specimens became so much injured in travelling as not to be 
worth preserving. 
