A HISTORY OF SURREY 



thoroughly worked by collectors of the Lepidoptera than Surrey, and it is 

 unlikely that many rare or local species have been overlooked. Whatever 

 number of species may have occurred therein in the beginning or middle 

 of the last century, there can be no doubt that the Rhopalocera (Butter- 

 flies) throughout the greater portion of the county are, and have been for 

 many years past, poorly represented both as to species and the quantity 

 of specimens. The number of species occurring in Surrey does not equal 

 the number recorded for either Kent, Sussex, Hampshire, Dorsetshire, 

 Devonshire, Gloucestershire or Northamptonshire. All the counties named 

 contain local species of considerable interest ; but no butterfly is found in 

 Surrey which does not occur in most of the southern, eastern, western 

 and midland counties. The greater part of the north-eastern portion of 

 the county is absorbed by south London, while the suburbs extend to 

 Croydon and Reigate on the south, and to Surbiton, Epsom, Leatherhead, 

 Molesey, Esher, Walton-on-Thames, Weybridge and Woking on the 

 west and south-west. In this more or less suburban district the butter- 

 flies with the exception of the commonest and most widely distributed 

 species, or species which occur sporadically, like Colias edusa, C. hyale and 

 Vanessa cardui are conspicuous by their absence or extreme rarity. This 

 may to some extent be accounted for by drainage and building operations, by 

 London smoke, or by the extermination of local species by over-collecting. 

 No one accustomed to the woods of Hampshire, Sussex, Northamp- 

 tonshire, Gloucestershire and many of the other English counties can 

 fail to be struck by the rarity, and in some cases the entire absence, of 

 sylvan species such as the Fritillaries in localities like Coombe Wood 

 near Kingston, the Prince's Covers near Claygate, Ashtead Woods 

 between Surbiton and Leatherhead, or Bookham Common between Stoke 

 d'Abernon and Bookham. Even further from London, in the woods 

 between Effingham and Ockham, or in the wild moor and woodland 

 country extending from Ranmore Common on the east to near Guildford 

 on the west and from Horsley on the north to Shiere on the south, 

 the scarcity, or entire absence, of more or less local butterflies is 

 astonishing. On the other hand the list of the Heterocera (moths) 

 found in Surrey is a fairly good one, though it is not equal to the lists 

 for Hampshire or Sussex. 



RHOPALOCERA 



Butterflies^- 



The Wood White (Leucopbasia sinapis, L.) is recorded by Mr. Barrett 

 as formerly common at Haslemere, but the writer has never met with it 

 in the county, or received any notes of its occurrence from any of his 

 other numerous correspondents. If it ever occurred in any of the Surrey 

 woods in addition to the Haslemere locality, it has probably been 

 extinct for some years as it has been in many of its former localities in 

 adjoining counties. 



1 The caterpillars of the Swallow-tail (Papilio machaon, L.) are recorded by the late G. Austin 

 as having been taken fifty years ago in the osier beds in the Battersea fields. H. G. 



no 



