MIGRATION OF VARIOUS BIRDS AND INSECTS. 



469 



The extent, also, to which insects migrate, or rather wander, seems 

 never to have sufficiently engaged the attention of entomologists. Most 

 persons must have remarked, on perusing an account of the localities 

 of our rarer strong- winged insects, (such as the Sphingidce, many of 

 the butterflies, &c.,) how very many of them have been principally 

 taken on the eastern and southern coasts of the kingdom. My 

 friend, to whom I am indebted for the above information on birds, 

 mentions having seen several small moths flying out at sea, when about 

 ten miles distant from the Suffolk coast ,* one only of which was 

 captured, which I find to be the Lampeti'a defoliaria. Mr. Stephens, 

 also, records an instance of the death's-head hawk-moth (Acherontia 

 atropos) being captured four miles at sea ; and I have myself observed 

 numberless instances of diurnal moths, and butterflies, flying at a 

 considerable distance from land. I have repeatedly seen the humming- 

 bird hawk-moth (Macroglossa stellatarum) fly straight out to sea ; 

 also, on two or three occasions, the clouded yellow butterfly (Colias 

 Edusa,) the small copper butterfly (Lycoena Phloeas,) and once, the 

 wall butterfly (Hipparchia megcerci). I have picked up, also, in the 

 isle of Jersey, amongst the rejectamenta of the sea, a drowned specimen 

 of the large rhinoceros beetle (Sinode?idron cylindricum,) and I could 

 here enumerate various other instances of insects being captured in 

 the Channel ; but the species, in which, of all others, I have most 

 frequently observed this wandering propensity, is the beautiful painted 

 lady butterfly (Cynthia Cardui). 



There is not, perhaps, any lepido^>terous insect whatever, the 

 natural history of which would comprise so many curious particulars 

 as that of the interesting and elegant butterfly, Cynthia Cardui. All 

 the insects, it will be observed, whose names are above mentioned, are 

 known to possess a wide geographical range ; but the painted-lady 

 butterfly may be even said to be an inhabitant of the world at large. 

 Mr. Rennie informs me, that he has seen specimens from America, 

 from the Caucasus, and from China ; I have seen them from North 

 America : the species is said, also, to occur in Otaheite and Australia, 

 and it is undoubtedly found in Africa. Reports, however, of this kind 

 must be received with some degree of caution, as, without actual and 

 careful comparison, distinct species may have been confounded together. 

 Many birds (particularly of the order Grallatores) were once thus 

 said to inhabit all parts of the globe ; until it was shown, by careful 

 and minute comparison, that different creatures had been confused 

 together : I allude to the species of Scolopa.v, Charadrius, Thalasi- 



