LEPIDOPTERA OF LA SAINTE BATJMB, VAR, S. FRANCE. 17 



marked. M. parthenie was in its last stage of tattered garments. 

 On the 24th Liinenitis Camilla was not infrequent on the road 

 descending to Nans, and G. cleopatra (females) and Satijrus 

 alcyone first appeared. On June 25th I made across the plateau 

 in the opposite direction to climb the Col de Bretagne. I 

 afterwards found that there is a much better path and much 

 better sport by the forest under the mountains. All the way 

 insects were most abundant. In one or two openings, or little 

 meadows, which slope southwards from the edge of the wood to 

 the plateau, I saw, I think, a greater number of butterflies than 

 I have ever seen in an equal space — not excepting Swiss locali- 

 ties. L. Camilla was specially noticeable. I have often seen 

 L. sybilla in flocks, but never before Camilla, though the latter 

 is, I should say, a more widely distributed species. 



At the top of the Col, just under the perpendicular mass of 

 the Pic de Bretagne, Polyommatus escheri was well represented 

 by strikingly fine specimens of both sexes. One female shot 

 with blue was the first I have seen of this fofm. I sent it to 

 Mr. Wheeler, who informs me that "this slightly blue form of 

 female escheri is stated by Turati to be cominon in the Alpes 

 Maritimes." Mr. Wheeler further says that there is another 

 form about as blue as corydon ab. semisyngrapha ; this has been 

 named suhapennina by Turati, and is not very scarce on the 

 lower slopes of the Apennines ; and that he himself has taken 

 one such at Fiesole, which he exhibited before the Entomological 

 Society, London, in 1909. These, I suppose, are comparatively 

 newly noted varieties, as I find no allusion to any blue forms of 

 the female either in Staudinger, Eiihl, Wheeler, or the new 

 editions of Spuler's or Berge's ' European Butterflies.' * P. 

 escheri was to be taken all over the district, but it was on the 

 Col that it evinced the greatest beauty of form. In this walk 

 Pyrameis cardui was often to be seen, six and eight at a time. 

 Agriades thetis [hellargus ? adonis?) was also there, both worn and 

 in good order. The males generally large and of a deep blue, 

 rather of the lilac tone of colour, and frequent among them 

 ab. puticta, Tutt. Last year I had taken a very beautiful male 

 hybrid, polonus, and hoped, but in vain, to renew my good 

 fortune this year. A few ragged icarus were to be seen, and a 



* The Polyommatus escheri of the Bouches du Ehone has a special 

 form, and, though not so large as Andalusian examples, is generally lai'ger 

 than those found on the Central Alps. M. Oberthur makes special mention 

 of the female form (Lepid. Comparee, fasc. iv. p. 214), to which he has given 

 the name var. foidquieri, after M. Gedeon Foulquier, of Marseilles, who, 

 with Dr. Siepi, has done so much to introduce lepidopterists to the fauna of 

 this interesting region. I do not think either of them report the form 

 analogous to syngrai^lia; but the " slightly blue " form is not uncommon in 

 the hill districts of the south-east. I have myself taken it at Nyons (Drome), 

 Alios (Basses- Alpes), and St. Martin-Vesubie (Alpes-Maritimes) ; and, in the 

 words of M. Oberthiir, these, like var. foulquieri, " montrent pres du corps, 

 des atomes bleus." — (H. E.-B.). 



ENTOM. — JANUARY, 1914. C 



