THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 231 



Fringes blackish : 



12 — Levettei. 15 — residua. 



1 j — insolabilis. 16 — tristis. 



14 — A?igusi. 



It is somewhat strange that there are as yet no black-winged species 

 known from California. One is described from Siberia, C. dissimilis 

 Bremer. 



Catocala relict a. 



In my first general paper on the North American species of Catocala 

 (Proc. Ent. Soc. Phil., Jan., 1872), the brief notice of C. relicta includes 

 the statement that " the narrow central fascia of the secondaries is pure 

 white." Up to this time I find no notice of a distinct powdering of blue 

 scales which edge this fascia (more noticeably sometimes about the middle 

 of the wing) on my present examples. It is not easy to see these blue 

 scales at first, but the attention once directed to them, they become 

 apparent. This discovery leads me to compare more closely our species 

 with the European fraxini, which it is held to " represent," and which 

 has the central fascia of the hind wings entirely bluish. The European 

 species seems to be larger than relicta ; the transverse posterior line less 

 perpendicular, more deeply notched and more outwardly exserted opposite 

 the cell, with more prominent teeth. Above the primaries are evenly 

 dusted with dark scales in fraxini, and consequently more unicolorous ; 

 the darkest specimens of relicta evidently owe their color to a spreading 

 of transverse blackish shades, the ground color, however narrowed, being 

 white. The edge of the hind wings is white in relicta, gray in fraxini. 

 Beneath both the species are pure white. The similarity of the under sur- 

 faces in these two species led me to reflect on the fact that in the Noctuidae 

 variation seems to be shown first on the upper surface of the primaries ; it 

 will be recollected that these are the more often exposed. There is, then, 

 more white on relicta, on both wings ; the central and principal portion of 

 the fascia on the hind wings being pure white. With a large material 

 in all stages it would be interesting to more fully compare the two 

 species, which have probably a common origin. It is interesting, 

 meanwhile, that the blue color is retained in both forms, although in one 

 it may not always be expressed. If the two species had a common par- 

 entage, the blue color has been affected most probably by the different 

 surroundings of the now separated forms. 



