— 41 — 



(Goeze): Abhandl. z. Gei9ch. der Ins. 1781 getan ha- 

 ben, ist freilich bequem, aber nicht überzeugend; denn 

 einem Linné oder einem Fabricius eine Leichtfertig- 

 keit in der Diagnose auf den Kopf zu werfen, kann 

 vielleicht Frechheit, aber niemals kritischen Sinn 

 bekunden. 



Dazu kommt noch ein zweiter ge^dchtiger Zweifel. 

 Wer seine Caraben gut kennt, der weiß ganz positiv, 

 daß unser jetziger Car. violaceus L. nicht einen gol- 

 denen Flügeldeckenrand besitzt. Es ist nahezu 

 mit Sicherheit zu vermuten, daß beide Altmeister 

 den vermeintlichen violaceus L. für identisch gehal- 

 ten hatten mit unserem Car. marginalis F. und daß 

 sie nicht imstande waren, beide Tiere richtig ausein- 

 anderzuhalten; denn der eine wie der andere spricht 

 das einemal von margine a u r e o , das anderemal von 

 margine v i o 1 a c e o. Erst im J. 1794 im Appendix 

 des IV. Bandes der Entomologia S.ystematica S. 440 

 und im J. 1801 in S.ystema Eleutheratorum S. 169 

 Post No. 4 wußte ihn Fabricius zu scheiden; Sturm 

 dagegen hielt ihn noch im J. 1815 in Deutschi. Ins. 

 S. 85 Post. No. 32 für einen violaceus. 



(Nebenbei bemerkt ist Ganglbauers Zitat des 

 Fabricius bei Car. marginaUs in diesem Sinne zu korri- 

 gieren.) 



Es ist nicht bloß belehrend, sondern es läßt tief 

 blicken in die Entmckelung des Menschengeschlechtes, 

 wie es sich auch auf diesem Gebiete nur mühsam 

 Schritt für Schritt emporarbeiten mußte, bis es zur 

 jetzigen Erkenntnis gelangen konnte und wie es un- 

 erläßlich bleibt, daß eben dieses selbe Menschenge- 

 schlecht immer wieder und in verschärfter Weise sei- 

 nen Rückblick bis auf den LTrsprung seines Wissens 

 werfen soll und muß. Nur das kann der wahre 

 Fortschritt genannt werden. 



57. 83: 15 



The Woudeifiil Siglits of the English 

 Clover Field. 



by A. H. Swinton. 



The female of edusa, as is known, is sometimes yel- 

 low instead of orange, and one captured among the 

 ferns at Netley Abbey long did duty in my collection 

 as hyale ; the male of the former has a chalky spot 

 on the hind wings which retains a faint fluffy smell, 

 at times no doubt the butterflies become perfumed 

 from the scented blossoms thej^ are accustomed to 

 visit. There is a variety of the female of hyale that 

 has been noticed at Market Harborough in the 

 Midlands and elsewhere, that has the sfiots on the 

 wing margin rejolaced by a pale band. One of these 

 oddities that might have been seen fljHing about the 

 cliffs of Boulogne on the 22nd September 1887 iironip- 

 ted a headlong chase, an old woman who had probab- 

 ly never given her attention to entomologj'- expressed 

 her astonishment that an Englishman should dare 

 to behave so like the wild rabbit on the sacred soil 

 of France. We are assured by Mr. W. Farren that 

 hyale when captured has a smell of pine apples. 



On making an abstract of the Entomological 

 Magazines in the British Museum Reading Room 



it appeared that the t\\o butterflies commenced to 

 be noticed in the English cloverfields at the time 

 of fewest sun spots, and according to Mr. E. A. 

 Fitch edusa abounded in 1811, 1833, 1843, 1855, 

 1868 and 1877, among the clover, and hyale attrac- 

 ted notice in 1842, 1857, 1868 and 1877; that is 

 at the time of fewest. The year 1877 is still remem- 

 bered as the great edusa year and singular to say 

 edusa was then by no means common out of Bri- 

 tain, the year was wet and sunless, the honey har- 

 vest was bad, the fruit harvest worse, and the corn 

 harvest the worst in recollection since 1843. 



In august 1899, when I wrote to Kew Obser- 

 vatory to ask when the sun spots \\ould be at their 

 minimum, the Reverend C. T. C'ruttwell was greatly 

 surprise to observe a large fUght of edusa at Renvyle 

 on the beautiful Galway coast of Ireland, just oppo- 

 site the rocky island of Achill, where several hun- 

 dred of the male sex in prime condition had esta- 

 blished themselves along a narrow strip of flowery 

 meadow land extending between the sand hills and 

 boggy land within, his three boys who were keen 

 butterfly catchers could discover no female among 

 them. At this time edusa was noticed at Cork in the 

 south of Ireland. The summer had been exceeding 

 dr_y and warm. The next year both hyale and edusa 

 were common objects in the red clover and lucern 

 fields at Dover, they attracted notice at the mouth 

 of the Thames and appeared in the Island of Guern- 

 sey, but they did not confine themselves to the sea 

 coast but spread over the south of England, several 

 edusa visited Totnes in Devonshire ^^•here little 

 wheat and no clover was cultivated, none were 

 afterwards seen there until the heat \\ave that 

 closed July 1908 which brought a solitary' individual. 

 It would occur these butterflies are periodically 

 imported into the British islands or blown over from 

 the mainland of Europe; and anyone who has stood 

 on the White Rock Pier at Guernsey and seen the 

 barges arrive like floating hay ricks from the flowery 

 meadows on the French sea coast, or in an idle hour 

 on the rjver bank at Herne Bay has watched the 

 lighters drifting on the flood up the Thames with their 

 burdens of forage, would incline to the former opi- 

 nion. After the year of most sun spots is gone the 

 Clouded Yellow butterflies cease to be noticed in 

 the clover fields. 



The Painted Lady Butterfly, known as cardui 

 on account of its caterpillars feeding in a web on 

 thistles, like the former butterflies apjJears for a 

 series of years in the clover fields in the south of 

 England and then unaccountably vanishes, in no 

 single locality, said Mr. H. T. Stainton, do I find 

 that it is a regular visitor. The summer of 1815 and 

 the two following were almost unceasingly cold 

 and rainy, scarcely a moth or butterfly apfieared, 

 and the early part of the season of 1818 was no less 

 ungenial, yet this Painted Lady, cardui, was fostered 

 into life and became te commonest butterflj^ of the 

 year. In the spring of 1883, cardui after having been 

 absent for two years returned to sun on the one 

 tree hill at Guildford in Surrej^ the said one tree 

 being an elm which had grown loaf shaped like an. 



