310 BRITISH BUTTERFLIES. 



difficult to keep in sight ; and it appears to hide most effectually. It 

 usually settles high up out of reach, and flies rapidly from one 

 position to another, resting sometimes, however, for a very consider- 

 able space. We have seen it in late August flying thus about the 

 oak-trees and tall sallow-bushes . in Chattenden Woods, about the 

 ash-trees far up the Visp Valley, between St. Niklaus and Zermatt, 

 about the willows and birch-trees in the "glen " above the Baths in 

 the Eaux-Chaudes Valley at Digne, above the bushes at the foot of 

 the Grand Saleve, and various other localities. Sometimes one sees 

 it busily investigating the tops of the blackthorn bushes on the 

 outskirts of the woods in Kent, or in the clearings in the woods, 

 and, on one occasion, in Piedmont, we saw the insect busy about the 

 scattered dwarf sloe-bushes that covered a rock-encumbered level, high 

 up between Bobbie and Au Pra, that had evidently been at one time 

 devastated by the foaming torrent of the Pellice. When thus engaged, 

 there is not much chance of making a bag of R. betulae. The species, 

 however, is, rather more than Bithys quercus, attracted by the nectar 

 of various flowers, and then it falls a ready prey. At the foot of 

 the Grand Saleve, the males choose the large blossoming heads of a 

 tall Umbellifer, and in the Visp Valley they made a similar choice, 

 although the species of plant may have been a different one, and here 

 both sexes were at the flowers. Between Useigne and Vex, in the 

 Val d'Herens, they chose thistle-heads, and fought for a place against 

 such sturdy hustlers as Dry as papilla, Argynnis adippe, A. aglaia, 

 A. niobe, Pyrameis atalanta, Agriades corydon, etc. In the lovely glen, 

 running into the Eaux-Chaudes, near Digne, they preferred the flowers 

 of Eupatorium cannabinum, where they had for companions Coenonympha 

 dorus, Melitaea deione, Loweia dorilis, Hipparchia aretliusa, Erebia 

 neoridas, Polyommatus meleager, Callimorpha hera, Lithosia caniola, 

 Antlirocera fausta, and a host of other interesting and beautiful 

 insects. Here, at Digne, however, most of those observed were 

 sunning on willow-leaves before and about noon, keeping their 

 wings closed during the time and flying off quickly when disturbed, 

 and it was not till after noon that they were seen on the 

 flowers of Eupatorium. These appeared to be all males. In the 

 Upper Verdon valley, between Alios and the Lac d'Allos, in the early 

 morning sun, between 9 a.m. and 10 a.m., on one of the hot slopes, 

 a male was observed sucking greedily the nectar from a dwarf thistle 

 flower ; it was resting with its back to the sun, and would have been 

 almost invisible if approached directly from behind or in front, but 

 passing it at right angles, it was much more easily seen, but might 

 easily have been mistaken for an example of Epinephele lycaon or 

 E. ianira, except for its brighter tint. Whilst feeding, both on thistle 

 and Eupatorium, the individuals kept their wings drawn down closely 

 together, nor did we observe any of the usual movement of the hindwings 

 so frequent in the species of this family. Carlier also observed it on 

 Eupatorium flowers at Rochefort, in August, 1888. Lewin states 

 that the insect loves best to fly over the tops of hedges, particularly 

 over maple-trees, on which it delights to settle. Birchall observes 

 that, in the south and west of Ireland, it is to be seen in August, 

 frequenting the flowers of the bramble and settling the moment the sun 

 is obscured, when it may readily be taken with the fingers ; he observes 

 it as being in profusion at flowers of bramble at Claring Park, in 



