LITTLE BLUE RESTING 



MIDSUMMER BUTTERFLIES 



MAY butterflies last long into June, and late June wakes 

 others which haunt the woods and heaths in July; the 

 longest day marks a sharper division in the lives of these 

 sun-loving creatures than for most other wild things. But 

 there are certain butterflies which are peculiarly the children 

 of midsummer, and as deeply associated with the pride of 

 the long June days as the wild roses or the yellow irises, 

 or the full gleam of the waving hay-fields. So long as the 

 hay stands uncut the common blue butterflies enjoy the 

 height of their season among the lotus and clover; but 

 their bands first broke into the hay-fields in May, and to 

 find the typical blue butterfly of midsummer we must mount 

 among the wild hay-crop of the downs. The attraction of 

 the little blue lies not in conspicuousness or special brilliance 

 of colour it is the smallest and one of the duskiest of its 

 tribe but in the punctuality of its emergence in the high 

 June days, and its faithfulness to some definite and fascinat- 

 ing spot. The rampart of a primeval encampment, lapped 

 for centuries with the smooth downland turf; a sheltered 

 dip in the downs where year by year the little burnt orchis 

 thrusts up its brownish spike ; some thyme-scented flank of 

 a thorn-clump, where the larks and the sheep-bells mingle 



