THE ENTOMOLOGISTS 
WEEKLY INTELLIGENCER. 
No. 160.] SATURDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1859. 
FOREIGNERS. 
In a letter just received from Funchal, 
in Madeira, are these words : “ The 
Tliecla puts me in mind of Quercus, 
but its habits are so different ; it 
abounds here on hill-sides and grassy 
plains, flying in the style of our Com- 
mon Blues in England. I have reared 
one from a larva feeding in the pods 
of peas, and have two or three others 
in pupae.” 
The writer little thought, as he 
penned these lines, that before they 
would meet the eye of the indi- 
vidual to whom they were addressed, 
the said Theda would have been 
captured on the chalk downs near 
Brighton ; it being no other than 
Polyommatus Bcetica, and from its 
caudal appendages being readily taken 
for a Theda. 
We noticed lately (Intel. No. 155) 
the occurrence of this denizen of 
Southern Europe in Guernsey, where 
it had not been seen for the last 
twenty years, and suggested that were 
it to occur on our own coasts it would 
create a sensation. Now we find that 
the capture of a specimen near Brighton 
[Price Id. 
has been recorded in the ‘ Zoologist ’ 
for October. Are we then to add it 
to our list of British Butterflies? If 
so, where are we to stop ? No one 
doubts that various American Sphinges 
have occurred at large in this country, 
but we do not include them in our 
British lists. 
The occurrence of a single Bcetica 
in Sussex cannot render that insect a 
British species. It might happen that 
by accident, or by a combination of 
circumstances, a number of European 
species might occur singly on our 
coasts in the course of the next tweuty 
years, and if every straggler obtained 
a permanent place in our lists, our 
list would tend to equal eventually that 
of Continental Europe ; but clearly we 
should be wrong so to naturalize these 
aliens. 
By British species we understand 
species which reside in Great Britain ; 
those that are only occasionally blown 
over can never he, whatever we may 
call them, truly British. 
We are perfectly aware that the 
argument we have been setting forth 
applies further than we have yet ap- 
plied it; but if the argument be sound 
let us apply it fearlessly. 
