30 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



NOTE ON HEMARIS UNIFORMIS AND ARCTIA SAUNDERSII. 



BY A. R. GROTE, BREMEN, GERMANY. 



I have sufficiently i>hown in various places (and the enquiring student 

 may consult the originals) that Kirby's description of Ruficaudis contra- 

 dicts that of Uniformis, in what we must regard as essential particulars 

 in this genus. We have not here to do with a species ; but, according to 

 Mr. Hulst's statements, with a dimorphic form of Thysbe, in which the 

 inner margin of the terminal band of primaries is even, not dentate, on the 

 interspaces. Now this character is not at all alluded to by Kirby. He 

 describes a Sesia allied to the European, and he says and knows nothing 

 about Thysbe or Pelasgus or Cimhiciformis. Kirby should not have 

 described Uniformis without comparing it with its ally — its other well 

 known form. Notwithstanding the probabilities of the case or the possi- 

 bilities, it never can be proved from the books that Kirby did describe 

 Uniformis as Ruficaudis. This is a matter of scientific importance, 

 because we are the first to point out that two distinct " forms " if not 

 " species" were passing as Thysbe, the differences which constantly divide 

 them being first pointed out by us, first used as the basis by which they 

 can be correctly separated and named in collections. It is therefore no 

 matter of simply restoring an older name. It is an attempt at construing an 

 older name and one which does not really apply. The attempt is therefore 

 to be deprecated as unscientific. The whole point lies in the separation 

 of the forms passing current as " Thysbe:' In this lay the scientific value 

 of the writings of Mr. Robinson and myself. This discovery, important 

 or not important (real it certainly is), was made by us and is covered by 

 the designation we apply to the plain form, and, according to all sense and 

 the principles of scientific nomenclature, this name should henceforward 

 apply. Clemens does not recognize Ruficaudis; Fernald mentions our 

 insect as ''Uniformis;''' I take it for granted that these or similar con- 

 siderations have influenced his course. It is years and years ago since I 

 studied Kirby in the original, at least fifteen years before Mr. Hulst's 

 time. It needed not that this industrious, but in his earlier studies some- 

 what inconsiderate writer, should tell me of the probabilities of what 

 Kirby's might be. At the best they are probabilities. I take it, that to 

 be correct, scientifically correct, the form of Thysbe with even edge to the 

 external band of primaries and of the same or similar size with the type, 



