LYCAENA ARION. 321 



brown. From the drawing, which is exact, the position of the eye-spots on the 

 disc is clear (Bergstrasser). 



If the drawing is exact, the description is a remarkably bad one. 

 It is a small light blue form, with a rather narrow, well-defined black 

 border, in which the marginal spots show distinctly darker. The 

 discoidal spot and four small submedian spots show clearly on each of 

 the four wings. The underside shows the normal spotting, and it 

 must be to this that the description refers, since there are no " eye- 

 spots " on the upperside. The fringe is white and has a somewhat 

 wavy appearance on the upperside figure, reminding one of the hind- 

 margin of the lower wings of $ P. weleager, but this is contradicted 

 by the underside figure, in which the outline is quite regular. 

 Bergstrasser calls it an aberration of telegone. It is a common form 

 among the Cornish specimens, the commonest, indeed, except that 

 there are seldom 4 spots on the upperside of the hindwings of the 

 latter ; it is also to be found in Germany. 



(j3) ab. telegone, Bergs., "Norn.," iii., p. 8, pi. lii., figs. 5, 6 (1779). Marginatus, 

 le Chanib., " Ent.," xli., p. 202 (1908). — Alis rotundatis integerrimis fuscis, 

 corpusque versus caeruleis, nigro in antica virgulatis postica punctatis, terms 

 infra punctorum oculorumque arcubus (Bergstrasser). 



This is a small, broad bordered, rather dark and rather heavily- 

 spotted form. It appears to be exactly what le Chamberlain means by 

 marginatus, which he describes as an " aberration of $ and $ with all 

 the wings possessing very broad black margins," and which he reports- 

 from the Cotswolds, adding that it is not common. It is not a rare 

 form except in low-lying localities, and in the south, but almost 

 (if not quite) unknown in the districts where the light southern forms 

 are predominant. 



(7) ab. cotsicoldensis , le Chamb., "Ent.," xli., p. 202 (1908). — Aberration of 

 c? and ? , with all the wings more or less thickly sprinkled with black scales, giving 

 it a very dusky or melanic appearance, constituting an approach to the alpine var. 

 obscura of Professor Christ. Scarce (le Chamberlain). 



Unless this should be regarded as the typical form, it is one which, 

 has long required a name. We have remarked above (p. 307) that 

 the apparent darkening of the ground colour is caused by an increasing 

 admixture of black scales, and not by a change in the colour of the 

 blue scales themselves. In var. obscura this increase of the black 

 scales takes the form of a gradual suffusion of the wings from the 

 dark border inwards ; here, the dark scales are not sufficiently 

 predominant to give the appearance of a black suffusion, but rather to 

 darken, more or less, the blue of the ground-colour. Though scarce 

 on the Cotswolds, it is a very wide spread form in northern localities, 

 in sub-alpine districts in Central Europe, and in some of the mountain 

 localities of the South, e.g., the Central Apennines. It is also 

 frequently to be found in var. cy anemia. 



(5) ab. aldrovandus, de Sel.-Lngch., " Mem. Soc. Roy. Liege," p. 35 (1844) ; 

 Lamb., "Cat. Lep. Belg.," fasc, iii., p. 40, fasc. xxvii., p. 428 (1907); Bebel, 

 "Berges Schmett.," 9th ed., p. 75 (1909); Seitz, " Gr.-Schmett.," p. 321 (1910). 

 — This Lycaena is, with iolas, the largest in Europe, for it has an expanse of more 

 than 22 lines, the largest examples of iolas scarcely reach 22 lines. It differs 

 above from avion in that the wings are almost as dark as in the ? of erebus (areas), 

 the last half, outside the row of black spots, not being powdered with blue. It is 

 a ? ; the fringe is white not interrupted above, the body seems proportionately 

 shorter and the wings more rounded. I took it at the foot of Vesuvius, on the 

 Resina side, at the beginning of May, 1838. It is probably only a fine local 

 variety (de Selys-Longchamps). 



