august 



XXXIII 



BUTTERFLIES have been as much in evidence this season 

 1917 as they were invisible during the 

 Painted dismally wet summer of 1916. They were 

 there all the time, no doubt, but lying low 

 in the herbage, waiting for the sun to bring them on 

 the wing. Not until September was the cloud canopy 

 withdrawn, and then we had a fair show of Red 

 Admirals. It has been quite different this year. 

 To-day 12th August there was as great a multitude 

 of the Small White (Pieris rapce) as I have ever seen 

 on the wing. We lay not much account by these, but 

 among them floated a distinguished individual in the 

 person of the Painted Lady ( Vanessa cardui), a species 

 which only appears at uncertain intervals in our corner 

 of the land, and then too often with battered and faded 

 wings, blown hither from other shires, or even shores ; 

 for we probably depend for those wafted from the 

 Continent for maintenance of the stock in these islands. 

 It is not easy otherwise to account for its apparently 

 total absence from Great Britain in certain seasons, 

 while in others it becomes quite a common butterfly. 

 Anyhow the Painted Lady la Belle Dame, as they 



