INSECT LIFE 175 



looks impotent. The cabbage-white and the green- 

 veined white butterflies belong to the third class, like 

 the meadow-brown and ringlet ; and with them I must 

 put the marbled-white butterfly, though it is patrician 

 to look at, whilst they are plebeian. The marbled- 

 Avhite with all its beauty, bold black and white wing 

 pattern, so effective in motion and in rest, is a humble 

 flier. Yet there are fine distinctions even among these 

 humble fliers of the third class of motion that are 

 worth noticing. Thus the marbled-white has a pretty 

 if a small soaring action which I have not noticed in 

 our common white butterflies. Sometimes, between 

 the ordinary tossing, bobbing strokes, and when it is 

 hesitating whether to settle or not for a few moments 

 on knapweed or scabious, or when it is examining 

 closely the ground among the grasses, the marbled- 

 white soars with wings not lying flat on the air, but 

 about half flexed. The action is over in a few seconds, 

 a trifling variation from the flight of my third-class 

 fliers ; but, whilst it lasts, it is a dainty little thing to 

 see. Every minute detail and difference in wing work 

 is worth watching. 



The pearl skipper was a stranger to me when I first 

 wrote of the wild life of Hampshire woods and hills. 

 I have discovered him and the tiny Bedford blue as 

 Hampshire butterflies within the last few years. The 

 pearl skipper flies in the fizzing heat of the summer. 

 In three Augusts I have watched him by the Kingsclere 

 road as I have watched in three Junes the ghost moth's 



