AMERICAN LEPIDOPTERA. 43 



Hydroecia circuiuluceus n. sp., pi. 2, fig. 31, £, genitalia. 



Ground color an even yellowish or red-brown, witli powderings. Head and 

 thorax shaded with purplish : a white tuft at the base of the antennae. The disc 

 of the thorax is more nearly of the ground color, and indeed the amount of pur- 

 plish shading varies in the different examples. Primaries with a white dot at 

 the middle of the base, all the lines traceable, but none of them contrasting. 

 Basal line geminate, extending to the middle of the wine;, sometimes a little 

 white marked, occasionally, in the darker specimens, scarcely traceable. T. a. 

 line geminate, as a rule white marked on the costa, but this also varies; a little 

 incurved and inwardly oblique to the submedian vein and then with the usual 

 strong outcurve. T. p. line broadly bent over the cell, well removed outwardly, 

 then oblique and a little curved to the inner margin. The line is geminate; but 

 the inner portion is quite usually obsolete. S. t. line marked by the contrast 

 between the usually darker s. t. space and the terminal space; also emphasized 

 by a few yellowish scales. It is outwardly toothed on the veins and irregular as 

 a whole. The apex is yellowish. The veins are marked with purplish, the 

 median shade line narrow, purplish brown, not contrasting, bent below the reni- 

 form. The inception of the t. p. line on the costa is marked by a white spot, and 

 there are three white dots on the costa before the s. t. line. The ordinary spots 

 are white and contrasting; the orbicular triangular, narrowly outlined by dark 

 scales, the. reniform moderate in size, a little constricted centrally, the lower por- 

 tion a little broader than the upper, the central portion consisting of a yellow 

 lunule surrounded by white, broken into spots as usual by the veins. The clavi- 

 form is double, white, the upper spot being uniformly smaller than the lower. 

 Secondaries varying from yellowish to purplish, sometimes with a central lunule. 

 Beneath shaded with reddish over a yellowish ground, hardly powdered, even 

 on the secondaries the veins a little darker. An outer line in most of the speci- 

 mens under examination, though a trace only in the darkest examples. Expanse 

 1.28-1.60 in.; 32-40 mm. 



Hub. — Newark, N. J.; Long Island, N. Y. ; Pennsylvania; 

 Champaign, 111. ; Nebraska. 



This species has been confused with rutila in collections generally ; 

 but it differs from that species quite obviously. It is a very narrow 

 form in the first place, which makes the primaries look shorter, it is 

 even in color, without powderings, and finally there is hardly any 

 contrast between the different portions of the wing: the s. t, space, 

 especially, being scarcely darker than the balance of the wing. 

 There is very little variation, so far as the specimens before me indi- 

 cate. Altogether ,ten examples have been under examination from 

 various collections. The male otters nothing that is peculiar, and is 

 of the regulation type for this series. The clasper seems a little 

 more toothed than in rutila, and is perhaps a little longer in propor- 

 tion. The tip of the harpe is not quite so much notched. 



Hydroecia rutila (In., pi. 2, figs 32 and 33, % genitalia. 

 1852. — Gn.,"Spec. Gen. Noct., i. 123. pi. 6, f. 1, Gortyna. 

 1856.— Wlk., Cat. Brit. Mus. Het., ix, 157, Gortyna. 

 1873.— Grote. Bull. Buff. Soc. Nat. s,-i.. i, 111, Hydroecia. 

 1881.— Grote, Bull. Geol. Surv., vi. 268, Gortyna. 

 1893. -Smith, Bull. 44 U. S. Nat. Mus., 177, Hydroecia. 



TRANS. AM. KNT, SOC. XXVI. MAY. !-!»:' 



