LYC^NIDJE. 247 



Has a very short tufted tail on third median nervule of 

 hind-wing, not observable in worn specimens. 



Common ; usually singly. Open ground generally. 



August (b) April (e). 



This is the brightest in hue of the South African Lyc<jen<z> and is otherwise 

 easily to be known by its broad white and black fringes and singularly 

 cheq'uered under-side. Its tails are almost rudimentary. Linne seems to 

 have taken the ? for a " Skipper," comparing it with Pyrgus Mahae under 

 the name of Pitho. 



Cape Town. Stellenhosch. Knysna. Plettenberg Bay. 

 Coll. Tri. 



Port Elizabeth. Coll. W. D'Urban. 

 South Africa. Coll. Brit. Mus. 

 " Bay of Port Natal." Boisd. 



148. Lycsena Celeeus. 



? . Papilio Celseus, Cram., Pap. Exot., pi. 379, f. K, K. 

 ? Hesperia Parsimon, Fab., Ent. Syst., Ill, 1, p. 303, 



[n. 147. 



Polyommatus Parsimon, Godt., Enc. Meth., IX, p. 683. 

 Lycaena Parsimon, Boisd. App. Voy. de Deleg., p. 588. 

 Celaeus, E. Doubl., List Lep. Brit. Mus., II, 



[p. 51. 



Polyommatus Asteris, Godt., Enc. Meth., IX, p. 657. 

 Lycsena Asteris, Wallgr., Lep. Rhop. Cajfr., p. 40. 

 Var. Lycaena Methymna, Trimen, Tr. Ent. Soc. 9 3rd 



[Series, I, p. 280. 

 Exp. 1 in. 2 lin. 1 in. 9 lin. 



$ . Dark violaceous-blue, pale violaceous-blue, or glistening 

 silvery-blue with a violaceous tinge ; hind-margin with a 

 narrow blackish edging, close before which (in hind-wing 

 nearly always, in fore-wing occasionally) is a more or less 

 distinct row of spots : cilia white, usually black-spotted in 

 hind-wing, rarely so in fore-wing. Fore-wing: a very distinct 

 disco-cellular black lunule of variable width (thinnest in the 

 silvery-blue examples, in one of which it is almost obsolete). 

 Hind-wing : spot of row between second and third median 

 iiervules black, edged inwardly by an orange lunule (broadest 

 in pale violaceous-blue specimens). UNDER-SIDE. Very 

 variable. Paler or darker brownish- grey : in each wing a 

 broad reniform white-ringed spot, darker than ground-colour, 

 at end of cell, a transverse row of confluent similar spots 

 beyond middle, two submarginal rows of white lunules 

 enclosing a darker space (the lunules of the inner row acute, 



