CELA.STRINA ARGIOLUS. 415 



side of the hindwing very large, usually completely confluent, and often suffusing 

 nearly the whole base of the wing, whilst the marginal markings tend to form a 

 broad band, etc. This agrees well with the figure, whereas the description might 

 pass for violacea of a silver-blue shade, and on which the white scales of the under- 

 side had been partially denuded, so as to disclose the brown subcolour, thereby 

 leaving the white area somewhat maculate. The fringes are white and black 

 alternately. The typical violacea is violet-blue above, light grayish-white 

 beneath, and all of one shade, there being nothing macular in it, with 

 dark points across the disks, and pale dusky crenations in outline on the 

 margins ; but while, in West Virginia, violet is a prevailing colour, many are 

 lavender-blue, or silver-, and some, especially females, are metallic-blue. 

 The range of colour embraces all the shades which are to be found in the 

 northern corresponding forms. The fringes are either white and black, as in 

 lucia, or on the hindwing white altogether. At the extreme north the underside 

 of violacea is not so white and pure as in the type, the brown subcolour appearing 

 more or less. The southern violacea considerably approaches neglecta, in colour of 

 both sides.] Now, in addition to the above-named and described forms, which 

 stand at the extremes of the series, there is another midway between lucia and 

 violacea, and distinctly characterised. The males are silvery-blue and as often 

 violet-blue, the females almost always metallic-blue, of the shade spoken of as 

 sometimes seen in the Virginian violacea. The fringes white and black, as in 

 lucia. The ground-colour of secondaries underneath is whitish and continuous, 

 and the marginal crenations are very heavy, confluent, black, making a conspicu- 

 ous band. There is no discal patch, and therein it differs from lucia ; the 

 marginal band separates it from violacea. This form is as unknown in Virginia, as 

 is lucia, but seems to prevail in New York, New England, and Quebec, at least in 

 the region about Montreal. I call this marginata. It has passed sometimes as 

 lucia, sometimes as violacea, but, by separating it, we shall get a clearer idea of the 

 species. Of . course, these three forms, distinct as they are generally, all vary, 

 and one approaches the other, or glides into the other, by. intermediate examples, 

 but I should say that 49 out of 50 individuals, no matter where found, would 

 range under one of these names. They all belong to the same species. Lucia 

 without the black patch is marginata, and marginata without the black and heavy 

 border is violacea. They are 3 phases of the winter form of the species, and 

 whether we call them trimorphic forms or three varieties makes no difference in 

 the result. At any rate, the two extremes, lucia and violacea, differ materially. 

 In West Virginia, violacea is the sole representative of these forms, there being no 

 examples so far known approaching lucia, and very few, indeed, approaching 

 marginata, even by a slight deepening of colour in the marginal band ; but it has 

 acquired a melanic male not before observed. Mr. Morrison took the same 

 melanic male together with both violaca and neglecta in South Colorado. In 

 many seasons, the blue males swarm in my neighbourhood, and assemblies of 

 scores and hundreds may be met with along the water-courses early in April, or in 

 the last days of March. The first generation vastly outnumbers its apparent 

 second one, which is made up of pseudargiolus flying in May, and neglecta in 

 June, and is now very abundant. Sometimes, with the early butterflies, a few 

 individuals are taken which combine the features of both violacea and pseudar- 

 giolus, the males having the upper-surface coloured as in the latter, but the under - 

 surface marked like the other, and often more emphatically than in the type. 

 I have such a mixed example from South Colorado also. Precisely at what 

 line lucia and marginata are suppressed, or where the melanic form comes in, I 

 am not able to state, etc. (Edwards). 



As Edwards points out in the above account, and, as shown by his 

 figures (Butts. Nth. Amer., ii., Lye. ii., figs. 3 and 4), marginata is a 

 slight aberration of lucia, chiefly characterised by having a dark mar- 

 ginal border to the undersides of the wings, and having lost the dark 

 central area of the hindwings, which lucia has in addition. It occurs 

 from about 45° N. lat. to 39° N. lat., the spring specimens above the 

 former latitude being lucia or violacea, whilst south of 39° N. lat. they 

 are entirely violacea. All three of the spring forms occur in Ontario, 

 Quebec, New England and New York, and, to the west, as far south as 

 Racine, Wis. In their territory they appear at the same time, no one 

 preceding another, as shown by observations at Brooklyn (Hulst), 



