JOURNAL OF VARIATION. 



Vol. XI. No. 7. July 1st, 1899. 



The Lepidoptera of St. Michel=de=IVlaiinenne. 



B.v J. W. TUTT, f .E.S. 



When one has, hke the writer, waded through miles of magazines 

 to obtain recorded locahties and the dates of appearance of various 

 species of Lepidoptera, a feehng arises that one ought, at whatever 

 inconvenience, to at least publish a hst of the insects observed or cap- 

 tured in an unexplored or little known district. The exigences of 

 other entomological ■work and the want of magazine space have 

 hitherto kept me from compiling a list of the insects observed at St. 

 Michel-de-j\Iaurienne, and only the necessity of removing some of my 

 captures to other quarters has at last compelled me to give the following 

 list of the Lepidoptera observed (1) on a single day, in late July, 1896, 

 when I walked up the zigzags behind the diligence from the little town 

 of St. Michel to Valloire, and (2) for eight days, in late July and early 

 August, 1S97, when I selected St. Michel as a hkely place to produce 

 some interesting species for the cabinet, without involvmg too much 

 labour in the getting. I must own I was just a little disappointed, for 

 although I obtained good series of several fairly common low-level 

 butterflies, presenting forms not altogether similar to our own, and 

 made, too, several observations on the Heterocerous fauna, yet the 

 sum total was not altogether satisfactory in the number of species 

 captured. I may add that I was so far unable to do any serious ento- 

 mological work at my second and longer visit that 1 confined my atten- 

 tion entirely to the lower slopes in the neighbourhood of the town. 



The town itself has an elevation of about 2,200ft., is situated on 

 the right bank of the Arc, and is dominated on the north by the Perron 

 des Encombres (2,K28m.) and although the town is not very attractive, 

 the picturesqueness of its surroundings is undeniable. All the express 

 trains to Modane stop here, and a diligence meets the morning express 

 (arriving from Paris at about 9. HO a.m.) to take tourists to L? Lautaret 

 ri>i the Col du (ialibier, an entomological locality made historical by 

 the researches of Boisduval and others now almost three-(juarters of a 

 century ago. 



Among the llhopalocera obtained were I'a/iilin iinildliriiis, abundant 

 in the roads, the males yellow and the females white in colour; 

 I'dliilin iiiar/iaon abundant in the clover and lucerne fields, whilst I'or- 

 iiax.sins ai„,l[n of large size increased in numbers continually as one 

 went up the mountains. Among the Pierids, A/xnia naldini was not 

 yet over, whilst I 'inis nu/'i i\h. lui/'acar, \t^ pupa' hidden in crannies 



