20 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



from the British lists, for, from that time forth, it ceased to exist as a dis- 

 tinct species, and became naturally a synonym of the older name of the 

 same species triiici, Linn., unless the list contained varietal names as 

 well as specific, when subgoi/tica, Haw., would naturally fall as a variety 

 o{ tritici, Linn. To say that subgothica, Haw., has "never been taken in 

 England since Stephens's time " is absurd, and begging the whole 

 question, for dozens are taken every year (from my point of view), where- 

 as if Mr. Slingerland refers to Gaenee Jacu/ifera, it, of course, never has 

 been taken in England, neither in Stephens's time, before his time, or 

 " since his time." 



We come now to the first introduction of the species into American 

 literature, the year 1856, Mr. Slingerland informs us, and then Dr. Fitch 

 applied to an American species the name subgothica, Haw. On what 

 grounds Dr. Fitch did this we cannot tell : evidently he did not know of 

 Doubleday's conclusion in 1847, t)ut I will say this — that the general 

 similarity between some examples of the two species, and the small 

 amount of systematic work which had been done in the American Noctitce 

 in 1856, are more than enough to excuse Dr. Fitch for supposing they 

 were identical; nor do I think that Mr. Slingerland scores a point when 

 he states that '• no American writer has seriously questioned the identity 

 of our species with the subgothica of Stephens and later English writers, 

 or even with the subgothica of Haworth until 1891, when Mr. Grote 

 changed his mind in accordance with the opinion of Mr. Tutt." Can 

 Mr. Slingerland wonder at this? What American entomologist had the 

 slightest knowledge of our British Noctuca ? I will go farther and ask — 

 What American has ? And now I will execute a bouleversement and 

 ask — What British entomologist knows anything of American Noctuce ? 

 You may answer, Mr. Walker and Mr. Butler ; but Mr. Walker's ignorance 

 was notorious, and the present condition of the Nocttice in the British 

 Museum is sufficient proof that Mr. Butler cannot name the commonest 

 British species. The whole thing is too absurd. The name was never 

 questioned, because there was no one to question it. 



Now we come to Doubleday's statement re " the species described 

 and figured by Stephens is American,"' and his explanation that he had 

 " traced all tlie specimens which he had seen of this species (the one 

 described by Stephens) in collections of British Lepidoptera to one 

 source, and I believe the gentleman who distributed them inadvertently 



o 



ni 



ixed a number of the North American insects with his British ones," 



