18 THE CAiJADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



Mr. Slingerland evidently does not know our British Agrotis tritici; 

 it is outside my brief to go into the protean forms it exhibits, but when 

 I say that my series comprises some 2,500 specimens, which have 

 received something Hke twenty-five different specific names, and a mere 

 summary of these occupies 15 p.p. in The British Noctuce and Their 

 Varieties, your readers will see that Mr. Slingerland is treading on 

 treacherous grounds when he is dealing with the subject, and suggests 

 that British lepidopterists cannot name their own insects, for this is un- 

 doubtedly the ultimate conclusion of his line of argument. 



Now, it is quite evident from Mr. Slingerland's remarks (p.p. 302- 

 303) that whatever specimens Haworth (before 18 ro) described his sttb- 

 gothica from, Mr. Stephens (1829) did not describe the same specimens, 

 for he described his from specimens obtained from Mr. Raddon, and the 

 specimens were labelled, "near Barnstaple, Devon." Now, I have to 

 add, as a matter of personal knowledge, that the coasts near Barnstaple, 

 Devon, produce A. tritici in immense numbers, and I can assure Mr. 

 Slingerland, and all other American entomologists, that I can match 

 exactly the specimens which Stephens figures, and Humphrey and West- 

 , wood copy, with undoubted genuine specimens of Agrotis tritici, and I 

 quite agree with my friend, Mr. C, G. Barrett, that these figures certainly 

 represent a variety of tritici. 



We now come to Mr. Slingerland's first move into the mists of 

 probability, and I would suggest to Mr, Slingerland that probability is 

 not critical science. I refer lo Wood's figure, reproduced in the plate, 

 fig. lb. Mr. Slingerland says : — " I think that a glance at the next figure 

 of the insect that appeared, taken, doubtless, from Stephens's specimen,* 

 will remove all doubt as to what insect Stephens tried to represent." I 

 object absolutely to this premise. There is not a scintilla of evidence to 

 warrant such an assertion. \\^e want facts and deductions therefrom. 

 We do not now, three-quarters of a century after publication, want an 

 assertion made as being " doubtless,' without a single fact to support it. 



Now, "up to 1847," Mr. Slingerland very rightly observes that 

 English Entomologists considered suhgothica a liritish insect, and a dis- 

 tinct species. Then Mr. Doubleday stated that " Haworth's insect is 

 evidently simply a variety of either Agrotis tritici or aquilina. The 

 species described by Stephens is American." Now, it is strange that I 

 had never noticed this reference before, but it fortifies my position. It 



'I li.'xve referred to this statenienl in detail farllier on. 



