LEPIDOPTEEA OF THE SWEDISH PEOVINCES OF 

 JEMTLAND AND LAPLAND. 



By W. G. Sheldon, F.E.S. 



(Continued from vol. xliv. p. 362.) 



Abisko is finely situated on the southern shores of the 

 beautiful Torne Traske, at an elevation, according to Baedeker, 

 of 1296 ft. The lake has a length of about sixty and a 

 breadth of eight or nine kilometres, and is surrounded on all 

 sides by mountains, which rise steeply out of it for a height 

 of from 2000 to 5000 feet. The shores are covered for some 

 500 feet above its level with forest, composed chiefly of 

 birch, with, however, a sprinkling of mountain ash and here 

 and there an isolated pine, and there are large quantities of 

 sallow of many species in the swampy ground. This forest 

 consists of trees, which on the water's edge attain a height of 

 twenty feet, and in sheltered positions, especially on the north 

 side of the lake, thirty and even forty feet is reached. The 

 undergrowth consists chiefly of Vacc'mium of various species ; 

 here and there along the whole length are tracts bare of trees, 

 and more or less swampy ; and it is in these spots and on similar 

 ones inland from the lake that the butterflies of the district are 

 almost exclusively found. They have a growth of Vaccinium of 

 four species, crowberry, dwarf sallow, dwarf birch, and many 

 beautiful flowers, including Andromeda polifolia, A. tetrago?ia, 

 and the nearly allied Phyllodoce ccerulea, Dryas octopetala, Trien- 

 talis europaa, Silene acaulis, Astragalus alpinus, saxifrages of 

 several species. Rhododendron lapponica, Azalea procumhens, and 

 many others ; in fact, the flora is for so high a latitude a very 

 rich one, and reminds one very strongly of that of the higher 

 Alps, many species being common to both. 



Naturally the "national park" greatly hampers one's proceed- 

 ings — much of the most fruitful ground, and the whole of the 

 most convenient, is included in it — and for this reason, although 

 the district all round is a magnificent one, and would probably, 

 if thoroughly hunted, produce nearly all of the species of Khopa- 

 locera known to inhabit the Arctic regions of Scandinavia, I am 

 compelled to advise entomologists and naturalists generally to 

 give it a wide berth, at any rate for the present. In the course 

 of time, as the country gets more developed, and there is a proper 

 service of boats on the lake that would enable all parts of it to 

 be worked, and huts are built in the mountains round, the case 

 would be different. I should mention that the surroundings of 

 the hotels of the Swedish Touring Club in other parts of the 

 country have also been constituted national parks, and therefore 

 the objections to Abisko as a resort for naturalists apply to 

 them also. In time no doubt the drastic nature of the regula- 



