LAMPIDES BOETICUS. 369 



do not hatch till the following summer. Milliere, after describing the 

 larva (already quoted antea p. 351) writes : — 



" This caterpillar lives in August and September in the pods of the bladder- 

 senna, Colutea arboretcens, L., of which it eats the still unripe seeds. Before 

 becoming fullfed, it travels several times from one pod to another. When young 

 it is nearly black, and only attacks the, as yet, hardly formed bladdery fruits. I do 

 not believe, as several naturalists who have spoken of the larva of L. boeticus say, 

 that it lives a first time in June. Such a fact can hardly be admitted when one recol- 

 lects that the bladder-senna produces its first pods at the end of July. (The earliest 

 fruits of the Colutea, in spite of constant examination, have never supplied me with 

 larvae, or given any indication of having contained them), and, as the larva eats 

 only the seeds, it could not actually appear before their development. In my 

 opinion, L. boeticus has only one season, although it may very well have several 

 generations uninterruptedly. One sees it flying freely in our vicinity from the 

 middle of August to the end of October in places where the Colutea grows. The 

 last females of this charming Lycaena lay their eggs on the branches of Colutea 

 arborescens. They ought not to hatch until the following year before the date of 

 the seeds proper for the food of the young caterpillar." 



Milliere further says it descends to the lower part of the plant to 

 pupate and the butterfly emerges in five or six days. He describes the 

 chrysalis (see antea, p. 357). In 1907, we discussed the question (Ent. 

 Rec.,'ix., pp. 250-251), and inclined to the opinion that, " L. boeticus 

 hybernates, if it really exists in Europe in the winter in any numbers 

 at all, in the imago state," and that Milliere's statements, that "the larva 

 lives in June and July, in the siliquas of Colutea," and " the imago 

 occurs in August and September," suggest that, in Europe, the main 

 brood is a late summer or early autumnal one, whilst the fact that eggs 

 were laid in October at Bordighera (Norris), and the records of captures of 

 imagines in October, in the Roman Campagna, and in " December, Janu- 

 ary and February," at Cannes, suggest strongly the " imaginal " as the 

 hybernating stage. Evidence of an earlier generation than that known 

 to Milliere, viz., in " June," in Spain, the Greek Islands (Naxos, etc.), 

 and of another yet earlier in " March " for Cairo, Algiers, Bona, etc., 

 was also discussed, and we concluded that " it appeared that, in North 

 Africa, in suitable places, this cosmopolitan and migrating butterfly had 

 many of the habits of Pyraweis cardui, emerging late in September 

 and October (this brood living in the imaginal state some time), laying 

 eggs, in due course, in winter and spring, fresh imagines appearing 

 again in March and April, in June and July, and so on. These, habits, 

 ingrained into the species in its tropical habitats, it carries with it 

 on its migrations, and presumably, attempts (with the result of some 

 modification) to do elsewhere what it does there with safety, resulting 

 in some uncertainty in its appearance in all those parts of the area 

 where it only occurs sporadically, and, as a result, probably, of its 

 migrating tendency." Chapman, on his wide knowledge of the early 

 stage of this species, writes {in litt., October, 1907) : " I differ 

 from Milliere in my view of the life-history of Lampides boeticus. Our 

 facts are very much the same, except that I have the advantage of him 

 in one particular. He believed Colutea arborescens to be the only food of 

 L. boeticus ; I know that it is a very occasional one. My experience is, 

 that it is at home on almost any leguminous shrub, and can be eaeily 

 reared on Lotus corniculatus. In northwest Spain, it affects Adeno- 

 carpits, but, whilst this plant swarms much more with Lawjia telicanus, 

 Lampides boeticus much prefers a species of JJlex, which is also its food- 

 plant in southwest France. If L. boeticus could hybernate as an egg, 



