Page:The Zoologist, 1st series, vol 1 (1843).djvu/287

Rh my first introduction to the insect, and I was much gratified by taking many specimens from the 18th of August to the 1st of October, on which latter day I took a very brilliant specimen, the last I saw for the season. I also observed the insect in still greater abundance the same year, on the opposite coast of Hampshire. It is only occasionally that I have it in my power to speak from experience of the appearance of Colias Edusa; lor here in Warwickshire it seems to be an insect of great rarity: to the best of my knowledge I never saw more than two examples of it in this county; these occurred September 16, 1808, and August 16, 1811. And I mention these dates, because, in those seasons when the insect does occur in this neighbourhood (where it certainly seems to be a rare and merely accidental visitant), I think it may have been abundant in the situations where it is more usually found. Who knows but our Warwickshire clouded yellows so seldom seen may have strayed from a maritime county? I shall have great pleasure in forwarding the success of 'The Zoologist ' as far as lies in my power, for its own sake, as I think it a most useful and interesting work, the discontinuance of which would, in my judgment, be a loss to the cause of Natural History, and to all those who love the fields and woods more than the jargon of science, which latter, it strikes me, is carried to such an excess as rather to impede than advance the study of Nature. Here, in 'The Zoologist,' is a convenient receptacle for all those facts and observations, which, but for such a periodical, would probably be lost, or at least never recorded for the benefit of naturalists in general.—W.T. Bree; Allesley Rectory, near Coventry, June 23, 1843.

Note on the capture of Colias Hyale. I enclose you an accurate figure of a beautiful variety of Colias Hyale, male, captured in August, 1842, by my friend, J. Harley Esq. It was flying swiftly, on a very cloudy day, in a lane near Market-Harborough, Leicestershire, and is now deposited in our cabinet of local insects, belonging to the Literary and Philosophical Society's Museum.

Colias Hyale, var.

The chief difference from the figure and description of a male C. Hyale, in the work of Messrs. Westwood and Humphreys, consists in the uninterrupted band of rich sulphur that completely divides the broad, black, apical margin of the fore wings, and the discoidal spot being intensely black. The hind wings are considerably rounder at the apex,—more like C. Edusa,—with the margins very faintly marked with black, and the discoidal spot or spots being scarcely discernable. The size is smaller than that usually given, and the contour of the insect strikingly different from the figure referred to. In an article by the Rev. W.T. Bree (Mag. Nat. Hist. v. 330) on several British Lepidoptera, there is mentioned a variety of C. Hyale which occurred at Dover,—a whitish one; this being the only description of any variation in the markings or colour of this insect I have met with: and were it usual in the case of a rare insect like C. Hyale, it would hardly have been unnoticed. It appears that by far the greater number of specimens of this insect have been captured on or near the seacoast; indeed, the Rev. Mr. Bree says,—"C. Hyale appears to be a maritime fly, occurring almost exclusively near the sea-coast: " so that it is not improbable that the very rare specimens which are found in the midland counties, will bear such a different and distinctive character in the markings, as to constitute perhaps a new species,