THE BLUE BUTTERFLIES. 



LYC7ENA GORDIU8. 



Another species (Lyc&na dispar, the Large Copper) used to be common, in the fens of the 

 Eastern Counties of England. It expands about two inches, and the male is brilliant copper, 

 with rather narrow black borders, and two spots in the discoidal cell of the fore wings. The 

 female has copper-coloured fore wings, with three discoidal spots, and an outer row of large 

 black spots. The hind wings are dark brown, with black spots, and a submai-ginal copper 

 band, and are bluish-grey beneath. The 

 caterpillar used to feed on the great 

 water-dock, but the insect has not been 

 seen alive in any stage for some thirty- 

 five years, and is believed to have be- 

 come quite extinct in consequence of the 

 draining of the fens. L. dispar is the 

 largest species of the genus ; yet the males 

 of some others surpass it in the brilliancy 

 of their colouring, and in some instances 

 the copper is strongly glossed with blue or 

 purple, as, in L. gordius, for example. But 

 these species are not British, though com- 

 mon in some parts of the Continent. 



The small blue Butterflies, so familiar 



to all residents in the country, belong to the genus Polyommatus* so called from the majority 

 of the species being decorated with numerous " eyes," or black spots in white rings, on the under 

 surface of the wings. In most of the species the males are blue and the females brown, but in 

 some cases both sexes are brown, and some few species white. But there are no white species 

 in England, nor is there (except P. bceticus, as an occasional visitor) any representative of the 

 section of the genus in which the hind wings are furnished with a short tail. The Common 

 Blue (Polyommatus icarus) is a Butterfly about the size of the Small Copper, and of very 

 similar habits. The male is lilac blue, with white fringes, and the female is blue or brown, 

 with a marginal row of red spots. The under surface is brownish-grey on the fore wings, and 

 yellowish-brown on. the hind wings, with a marginal row of red spots, bordered with black ones, and 

 a central row of eyes. There are also two or three spots nearer the base both on the fore and hind 



wings. In the Clifton Blue (Polyommatus adonis) 

 and the Chalk-hill Blue (P. cwydon) the fringes 

 of the wings are spotted with black. The males 

 of these insects are bright sky-blue and pale-blue 

 respectively, and, like most of the British species 

 of the genus, they are common on the chalk in the 

 South of England. The Azure Blue (P. argiolus) 

 is found in woods, flying about holly trees, but is 

 not common everywhere. The male resembles the 

 Common Blue above ; the female is blue, with 

 broad brown borders to the fore wings. The under 

 surface is pale blue, with a central row of small 

 black spots. The Silver-studded Blue (P. cegon) is common on heaths, and much resembles the 

 Common Blue, but the outermost of three rows of black eyes on the under side of the hind 

 wings is conspicuously dusted with bright metallic blue. Throughout this group of Butterflies 

 the species are best to be distinguished by the colour and markings of the under side of the 

 hind wings. In some Continental species, the upper side of which differs little from that of 

 English species, the hind wings are green beneath, or brown with large white spots. The caterpillars 

 of these Butterflies generally feed on vetches, trefoil, and similar plants, and a singular discovery 

 has been made respecting them in America. They exude a liquid from their bodies of which Ants 

 jare very fond, and these attend upon them for the sake of it as they do upon the Aphides. This 



* Many-eyed. 



FOLYOMMATUS CORYDON. 



