98 



THE YOUNG NATURALIST. 



May brings us to a numerous assortment of butterflies and moths. If we 

 visit the woods we shall see the Hairstreak {Thecla rubi) flutter by "like a 

 living leaf ; 99 and the butterfly whose wings are dashed with green and tipped 

 with rich orange \Antliocharis cardamines) , may be seen in plenty. One may 

 also see the Fritillaries Argynnis euphrosyne, A. selene, and Melitcea artemis, 

 and perhaps the " Duke of Burgundy " (Nemeobius lucina.) It is there 

 too, that 



" The Chequer'd Skipper as you tread 

 Springs lightly from its grassy bed." 



And not only Syricthus malvce, but Thanaos tages and the common Hesperia 

 sylvanus may be seen on a sunny day. The common Chortobius pamphilus 

 also flutters along, — 



" And like a fragment from the sky 

 Sweet Alexis gambols by." 

 (Alexis, of course I need hardly say, is the Lycmna icarus of Mr. Robson's, 

 list.) Among other butterflies which fly in May are Polyommatus phlceas, 

 Satyrus cegeria, the local Melitcea cinxia, and also Lyecena adonis, L. argiohs, 

 and L. agestis, which 1 must content myself with merely mentioning. 



I must not omit from my list of the Ehopalocera for May, the Swallow- 

 tailed butterfly (Papilio machaon), the Wood- white (Leucophasia sinapis), 

 and the rare Pieris daplidice, the occurrence of which in Cambridgeshire, I 

 was very pleased to see recorded, in the account in last month's Young 

 Naturalist, of the doings of that excellent association " The Haggerston 

 Entomological Society". In all probability Mr. Jobson is quite right in his 

 surmise that it breeds in the locality in which he found it ; if so, I earnestly 

 hope entomologists will take care not to extirpate. For my part, although 

 I shall look out for it, and shall be delighted to meet with it — should I be 

 so fortunate — I shall certainly not box any. 



By way of introducing the subject of moths for May, I cannot forbear 

 quoting further from the poem from which I have just been giving some 

 stanzas, and which (signed T. F.) appeared in the long defunct Entomologists 

 Weekly Intelligencer, some odd numbers of the last volume of which I found 

 one day lying in a second-hand book shop, and promptly purchased. It is 

 " An Invitation to the Woods," the wild woods where 



" Clouded bordered moths unfold 



Their tender wings of speckled gold, 



Where Fnciformis quivers round 



The stems with honeysuckle bound, 

 * * # 



Where Falcula, whose hooked wings 



Have eye-like spots, to the birch leaf clings, 



While near it, where the catkins play 



Papilionaria larvae stray. 



