THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 79 



NOTES ON NOCTURNAL LEPJDOPTERA. 



by a. r. grote, a.m., bremen, germany. 



The Species of Lithophane. 



Prof. Smith says that he uses the name Xylina in preference to Lith- 

 ophane^ because both are catalogue names and Xylina has priority, since 

 the Verzeichniss was not published until 1818 at least. My argument is, 

 that Ochsenheimer took the name Xylena from Hiibner's Tentamen* 

 (r8o8), cites Hiibner and includes his type iithoxyiea, which is not a 

 Lithophane, but a Hadena. Consequently, Xylina or Xylena falls before 

 Hadena and should not be used for this genus. I took Lithophane, 

 because it thus has priority for this genus, and because it includes socia, 

 which I designated as the type in 1874, being free to do so. It seems to 

 me this course is clear. Ochsenheimer, as I have proved, admits the 

 Tentamen as valid authority, and adopts Hiibner's names out of it in a 

 number of instances. The authority of the Tentamen is most certainly 

 established by Ochsenheimer's action and its prior date proved. See my 

 Buffalo list, and rny papers in Canadian Entomologist on this subject. 

 From an aesthetic point of view Lithophane is a more descriptive and a 

 prettier name, although this is no argument and a mere opinion of my 

 own. The fact is, that Ochsenheimer's Xylina is a mixed genus ; its true 

 type, since this author cites Hiibner, is a Hadena. Thus it cannot, under 

 the rules, be used for the present structural type. 



I have little to add to what Prof. Smith says as to the synonymy of 

 the species. I did not identify signosa, if I recollect rightly, from the 

 collection, but while I was in Buffalo, from a study of the description in 

 the British Museum Lists. If I made a mistake, as would now appear, 

 it is an excusable one. But what I do not understand is Fernald's testi- 

 mony, Bull. Geol. Surv., Vol. 5, 201, 1S79. ^^rom this it appears that my 

 petulca was " near, if not identical with Walker's infrtcctuosa," a species 

 now referred by Smith as a synonym of confusa, Hubner ! An entirely 

 different looking insect! Prof. Fernald does not mention my ^/^--^d^i-a, 

 Walk., specifically, l)Ut says : " The only Xylina which I found in the 

 Walkerean collection, under a different name from what they are known 

 by us, was Xylina antennata, Walk. This is X. cinerea, Riley." I had 

 only noted, in 1867, this gray species, but when I came to separate our 

 gray forms, Tfound three of them, and the question was, which one of 

 these Walker had. From my memory of the type and from Walker's 

 description, I felt sure it was cinerea, and, in this instance, Prof. Fernald 



