ZOOLOGICAL NOTES 119 



Acherontia atropos in Caithness. A Death's-head moth was 

 captured in a bee-hive at Watten, Caithness, on or about the loth 

 of September last by Mr. Francis Doull, postmaster there, who 

 kindly sent it to me through the Rev. David Lillie. WILLIAM 

 EVANS, Edinburgh. 



BOTANICAL NOTES AND NEWS. 



Rhinanthus Perrieri (pp. 56-7). This name does not "express 

 a character common to all, or nearly all, the species of a genus." 

 Even if it did, I would remind Mr. Druce that those words of the 

 Vienna " Actes " occur in a Recommendation, not in a Rule; they 

 are a guide for the future, rather than a restriction on the past. Dr. 

 J. von Sterneck's contention in his " Monograph of Alectorolophus," 

 p. 109, is that R. Perrieri, Chabert, cannot be distinguished from 

 R. minor, var. rnsticulits, Chabert ; the supposed difference being 

 " inapplicable for scientific purposes," and indeed non-existent in 

 the original specimens of R. Perrieri seen by him. As he states on 

 p. 1 08, R. Perrieri and R. minor, var. rusticulus, are synonymous ; 

 the specific must therefore supersede the varietal name. I agree 

 that Sterneck was not " free to choose " ; he ought to have written 

 Alectorolophus Perrieri, instead of A. rusiictilus. EDWARD S. 

 MARSHALL. 



Cerastium nigrescens, Edmonston (pp. 40-2). Mr. Druce has 

 given us an excellent sketch of the plant's history ; but I do not 

 think that he has proved the above name to be valid. Edmonston 

 first described it as C. latifoliuin, L., and subsequently as C. lati- 

 foliuin, var. nigrescens ; rejecting in the text the name C. nigrescens, 

 under which it had been mentioned in the preface to his "Shetland 

 Flora." In my opinion this remains a nomen nudum, and must be 

 discarded on technical grounds, though his opinion of its distinct- 

 ness from C. latifoliuin, L., of the Alps was correct. Even if, as is 

 alleged by Ostenfeld, Lange included a Greenland form of C. alpinum, 

 under his C. arcticum, that name should I think, be retained in a 

 restricted sense for our British species, which Lange endorsed as true 

 as C. arcticum ; the later C. Edmonstonii, Murbeck and Ostenfeld, 

 appears to be superfluous. 



Mr. Druce's account of the supposed hybrids is most interesting ; 

 and I have little doubt that his conclusions are correct. Syme's un- 

 localised C. alpinum, var. pubescens, is too briefly described for satis- 

 factory identification ; I suspect that it was C. alpinum x arcticum, 

 though it may have included one or more other hybrids. EDWARD 

 S. MARSHALL. 



Corallorhiza innata. Mr. A. Macgregor's query respecting this 

 species as a Moray plant seems not easy to answer. In Watson's "Out- 

 lines," 1832, p. 279, no mention is made of Moray ; Ross is given. 



