DIADEMA MISIPPUS IN TENEEIFE. 13 



hat, but in trying to secure it with his hands it escaped. Not 

 only had the hall porter at the hotel seen it, but a friend of mine, 

 staying there, told me later that he also had seen a butterfly 

 (described again as "black, with white spots") flying about, quite 

 distinct from any other butterfly he had noticed here. The 

 English Chaplain, the Rev. Laurence Hamerton, had also seen 

 this black and white visitor, and being an entomologist himself, 

 had been out every day with his net to try and catch it. Mr. T. 

 Reid, the son of the British Vice-Consul, had also seenit. So the 

 fact seemed established, without doubt, that some new butterfly 

 had really come to this island. 



I had to leave Orotava next day to return to Santa Cruz, with 

 rage in my heart at the stupid business which imperatively 

 summoned me away froui the scene of the new butterfly's 

 mysterious flutterings. I had not then had the pleasure of 

 making Mr. Hamerton's acquaintance, but' my feelings towards 

 him as I drove back to Santa Cruz were not charitable and not 

 Christian. Why, I said to myself, should he be assiduously 

 pursuing this prize, while I was unable to give chase as well ? 



I was prevented going over to Orotava again till about a week 

 ago. Imagine my feelings when the hall porter at the hotel 

 greeted me with the information that Mr. Hamerton had caught 

 two specimens of the butterfly. I rushed off to the parsonage 

 and sent in my card. Mr. Hamerton at once came out, and 

 courteously and willingly showed me the two butterflies — two fine 

 male Diadema misippus. One he told me he had caught flying 

 in company with D. chrysippus, 



I was again summoned back suddenly and unexpectedly to 

 Santa Cruz, without myself having seen a specimen of Z). 

 misippus. However, the day after I returned, when I came back 

 to Salamanca (the house in which I am at present stopping), I 

 was greeted by my sister-in-law. Miss Douglas, with *' What do 

 you think? I've caught the Orotava butterfly ! " And this noble 

 girl (does not she deserve a medal from the London Entomolo- 

 gical Society ?) produced a case in which was a lively and 

 beautiful male D. misippus, I did not (like Mr. Bultitude, when 

 Dr. Grimstone told him he was to be expelled) indulge in 

 ** indecent rapture," but I felt, as Keats says — 



" Like some watcher of the night 

 "When a new planet swims into his ken." 



And this is the true history of the first appearance in these 

 islands of D. misippus. So far three specimens have been 

 caught, all males. The female, having such a close resemblance 

 to the D. chrysippus, now so abundant here, would naturally 

 escape notice. That they will be caught later hardly admits of a 

 doubt. 



I should be inclined to think that these D. misippus did not 

 reach here by flight from the nearest land where they are found—- 



