162 THE entomologist's becokd. 



But the spot midway between these was much more inconstant in 

 size. In about 60% this spot was reduced to a dot without a pupil. 

 In about 30% it was absent or with only a trace. There was very little 

 and only slight asymmetry. On the hindwings there were always three 

 well developed eye-spots with the exception of two examples, both 

 of which had an additional spot above the other three. The spotting 

 of the undersides was in every case a replica of the upperside. A 

 few, very few, E. extryale were noted among the E. yoante, they 

 assumed the habit of settling on the perpendicular face of the rock 

 through which the new road had been cut. This face was consider- 

 ably elevated above the general level of the valley, and was exposed to 

 the full sun towards the south-east. The butterflies came from the 

 pine clad slopes below in ones and twos at a time, rarely weie more 

 than three seen at one time, and only when the sun was clearly 

 sbining. 



August 19th was quite an autumn morning in the feel of the air. 

 Intermittent gleams of sunshine allowed a little collecting, but our 

 minds were getting more uneasy day by day as the " news," such as it 

 was, became more depressing. The eyebright Evphrasia was noAV a 

 common flower, although both flowers and insects were becoming few 

 and scarce, a small number of favoured spots excepted. Has any one 

 ever of late years seen Pontresina without its stream of visitors on a 

 bright sunny day in summer ? We walked over, in the afternoon and 

 saw only half a dozen with scarcely as many natives. The beautiful 

 place was deserted, shops shut, hotels boarded up, all closed and 

 deserted. One seemed lost, and with a last look up the beautiful 

 Eosegg Thai, with its head embosomed in the glorious sunlit snow 

 fields, we turned for our walk back adown the street, across the 

 meadows and the stream, across the railway, through the pinewoods, 

 along the road by the Statzer See and St. Moritz Lakes by the Switzer- 

 hofi" and St. Moritz Station, to our diggings, longing, I must say, for 

 our home and friends. Nothing fresh had turned up entomologically. 

 There was an abundance of moths on the tree-trunks and among the 

 undergrowth. Larentia caesiata, Lyi/dia popidata, Gnophids. two 

 species of plume, IScaiiariae, Aphelia osseana were in abundance. Most 

 species were very wary, an approach of ten or twelve feet was quite 

 sufficient to disturb them from their resting places, whether tree- 

 trunks, rocks, or undergrowth. Gnopho^i tvncbiaria, one of the largest 

 species of the genus, was obtainable, chiefly females now, usually 

 disturbed from overhanging tufts of grass, and I'liisia i/cniniia, odd speci- 

 mens, but never seen more than about two or three per day. Cidaria 

 verberata could also be taken in small numbers. 



August 20th. — To-day I found the haunt of Aricia di>inelii, among 

 the younger pine trees clothing the slopes above the footpath running 

 through them towards Campfer. The males were plentiful sitting on 

 the plants of (jreraniinii pratense, which grew plentifully at this spot, 

 and quite near the E. f/oante rocks. I took a solitary Afjlais urticaf, in 

 fact I saw no other traces of this usually, at any rate in the larval stage, 

 abundant butterfly, nor were there nettles sulflcient to attract the 

 females on oviposition bent. Ai/riades coridon still hung on, and the 

 pretty Anaitis paltidata, a close relative of our A. plai/iata, was quite 

 common. In the afternoon we went toward Celerina and took a steep 

 path on the mountain slopes leading to the quarries. Here the usual 



