266 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



of the late Mr. Henry Doubleday, and closely resembles the 

 specimen recently captured by the Rev. O. Pickard-Cambridge. 



—Ed.] 



RANDOM NOTES ON NEW ZEALAND LEPIDOPTERA. 



By Gervase F. Mathew, R.N., F.L.S., F.Z.S., &c. 



(Concluded from p. 250.) 



On February 7th I had arranged to go to Drayton, at the 

 foot of Mount Hutt, and some seventy miles from Lyttelton, 

 where I had been kindly invited by Mr. Chapman (a brother-in- 

 law of Mr. Fereday's) to stay for a few days for the purpose of 

 ascending the mountain for Erebia pluto, which is to be found 

 there at an elevation of 4000 feet. Unfortunately when I rose in 

 the morning it was pouring with rain, and the glass showed such 

 evident indications of bad weather that I decided not to go, 

 especially as I had been told that E. pluto only flew in the 

 brightest sunshine. Moreover, Drayton was a long way off, and 

 there was only one train daily each way, as far as Methven, from 

 which one had to drive five or six miles further to Drayton. As 

 it afterwards turned out I was sorry I did not go, for there was 

 no rain at Drayton, and this and the two following days were 

 beautifully bright and fine. I have since found out that it often 

 rains and blows at Lyttelton when it is perfectly fine inland. 



On February 9th I went to Springfield, a small township near 

 the Mount Taurus range, in the hope that I might be able to 

 ascend some distance, and by chance come across E. pluto ; but 

 when I reached the place, and asked the proprietor of one of the 

 hotels how long it would take to walk to the top of the nearest 

 point, I was informed, much to my disgust, that I should have 

 started at daylight, and that then I could not have got there and 

 back unless I happened to be an exceptionally good walker ; so, 

 as I had only about four hours at my disposal, I had to give up 

 all idea of it. The air in this country, particularly near the 

 mountain regions, is so beautifully clear and highly rarefied that 

 distant objects always appear to be very much nearer than they 

 really are. My time being so short I procured a trap and drove 

 to the foot of one of the nearest spurs, and as this took me more 

 than an hour I had only about two hours left to wander about in ; 



