The food-plant is the horseshoe vetch (_Hippocrepis comosa_). From eggs laid in August, the caterpillars appear to hatch towards the end of September, but do not feed up until the spring. Butterflies from these caterpillars are on the wing between the middle of May and the middle of June, thus occupying about nine months in passing through the various stages from egg to perfect insect. From eggs laid in May and June the butterflies appear in August and September. Although it is found in similar kinds of situations to those affected by the last species, and sometimes on the same grounds, it is more local, and almost confined to the counties of Kent, Surrey, and Sussex. It is, however, rather common at Ventnor and in some other parts of the Isle of Wight, and is found near Winchester. Barrett states that it is abundant at Corfe Castle, Dorset, and gives as localities for the butterfly Wotton-under-Edge, and near Bristol, near Torquay, Sidmouth, and Seaton. Its range abroad extends through Central and Southern Europe, to Armenia, Northern Asia Minor, and Western Kurdistan. It is also found in North-West Africa, where the males are greenish-blue with conspicuous black spots on the outer margins of the hind wings; this is the var. _punctifera_. The Holly Blue (_Cyaniris argiolus_). About the beginning of the eighteenth century this butterfly (Plate 113) was known as the "Blue Speckt," but Harris, in 1775, changed the name to the "Azure Blue." The male is a pretty lilac-tinged blue, with a narrow black edging on the outer margin of the fore wings, often only in evidence towards the tip, and a narrow black line on the outer margin of the hind wings. The white fringes of the fore wings are distinctly marked with black at the ends of the veins. The female is of the same shade of blue, or sometimes much paler (var. _clara_, Tutt), with a broad blackish border on the outer margin of the fore wings extending along the front margin to about the middle; this border varies in width and seems to be wider in summer specimens than in those of the earlier flight; the discal mark on the fore wings is black, but this is sometimes very faint; there is a series of black dots on the outer margin of the wings. [Illustration: _Pl._ 110 =Adonis Blue.= 1, 2, 4, 5, 9 _male_; 3, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11 _female_.] [Illustration: _Pl._ 111 =Adonis Blue.= _Eggs, natural size and enlarged; caterpillars and chrysalis._] Although the colour of the upper side is somewhat like that of the Common Blue, it should not be confused with that species, as the under side is very different both as regards the colour, which is bluish-white, and the arrangement of the black spots. On the outer margins of the wings in some specimens there are more or less distinct traces of blackish crescents.