84 



BRITISH BUTTERFLIES. 



together by their ribs, but that they always avoid any association 

 with hairs or lenticles ; this we found also to be the case in 

 the other pupae so far illustrated (see preceding volume). In the 

 pupa of 8. w-album the lenticles are freely distributed over the 

 whole surface (except appendages), and the stellate points and 

 ribs are correspondingly curtailed, differing, therefore, from B. 

 quercus, in which lenticles are abundant only near the spiracles." 

 The most marked character, however, separating the Euralid (Theclid) 

 pupa from those of its allies is the obsolete 7th abdominal spiracle. 

 In all other butterfly pupae (including the Lycaenids and Chryso- 

 phanids), the 8th abdominal spiracle only is obsolete, but, in the 

 Kuralids (Theclids), the spiracles of both the 7th and 8th abdominal 

 segments are obsolete. Of this Chapman writes (in litt.) : " The few 

 Theclid pupae I have been able to examine agree in a character, which is 

 quite new to me, not occurring in the pupa of any other group or even 

 single species of which I haveany recollection. Of course, the pupae 

 I know are few, and, on this point, I have not examined more than a 

 small proportion of these, so that the peculiarity may not really be 

 rare. This peculiarity is the reduction of the spiracle of the 7th 

 abdominal segment to obsolescence, as well as that of the 8th. 

 It is curious that this shouid occur in the Theclids (Ruralidi), but not 

 in the Chrysophanids (Chrysophanidi) or Lycaenids (Lycaenidi). So 

 far as I know, the 8th abdominal spiracle is obsolete in all lepidop- 

 terous pupae, but, even in the remarkably modified pupa of Heterogynis 

 2 , the 7th remains functional. The remaining distinctions of Theclid 

 from other Lycaenid pupae are largely matters of degree, and do not always 

 hold good, so that the character now under consideration is a valuable 

 as well as interesting one, whether it proves to apply to all Theclids or 

 only to some one section of them." 



Probably no group of the Euralids is less thoroughly under- 

 stood than this, and the order in which they are placed in Staudinger 

 and Eebel's heterogeneous genera Thecla (Cat., 3rd ed., pp. 69-70), 

 and Zephyrus (pp. 70-71), is somewhat amazing. These two groups, 

 no doubt, give a fair grip of the species in the tribes Strymonidi 

 and Ruralidi respectively, but one wonders what myrtale, Klug, 

 has in common with sassanid.es and rhy minis, between which it 

 is placed, or whether, indeed, it is not a Callophryid or Thestorid. 

 Bethune-Baker has already very carefully worked out (Trans. 

 Ent. Soc. Lond., 1892, pp. 27-31) the little group consisting of 

 lunulata, Ersch., sassanides, Koll., tengstroemi, Ersch., rJiymnus, Ev., 

 and sinensis, Alph. (pretiosa, Staud.), and given us figures of their 

 genitalia. This remarkable little group, the species of which are 

 essentially Strymonid in their upperside facies, and exhibit on their 

 underside many of the characteristic spotted markings of the Lycaenids, 

 or " blues," in hardly modified form, indicates clearly how the "hair- 

 streak " markings of the underside are evolved from the ocellated 

 markings of the allied tribes ; indeed, because of this peculiar marking, 

 Staudinger, in his earlier Cat., 2nd ed., p. 7, placed one of them 

 (rhymnus) with the "blues" in Lycaena, which position Bethune- 

 Baker showed to be, on the structure of the ancillary organs, quite 

 untenable. 



It is unfortunate that de Niceville, with his great wealth of 

 material, did not give us some clue to the relationships of the 

 various groups at present tumbled into Zephyrus. That betulae and 



