who bred moths from them and " turned numbers of them wild 

 about Ealing, near Brentford, in Middlesex," where they were to be 

 found but not anywhere else that he had heard of. In passing I 

 may mention that Wilkes refers copiously to the older authors, often 

 quoting among many others the three that I have already mentioned, 

 but he does not refer to thein in regard to 0. dispar, which I think 

 may be taken as further evidence that it was not known as British 

 in their day. 



In this connection an entry in an old diary, for a note of which I 

 am indebted to Mr. Frohawk, is of interest. The diary was written 

 by a William Jones, of Chelsea, and is in the possession of Dr. F. 

 Dawtry Drewitt, of Kensington, and in it there is this entry " 15 

 July, 1764, Bred 3 female Gipsy Moths and 1 male." Dr. Drewitt 

 has also very kindly furnished the following information. " In the 

 diary of the ' Society of the Entomologists of London,' of which 

 Wra. Jones was the moving spirit, and who recorded butterflies and 

 moths captured or bred between May, 1780, and August, 1782, there 

 is no mention of the Gipsy Moth. In Jones' own list of 130 moths, 

 with dates of their appearance, etc., it is not mentioned, but in his 

 later list of 310 moths the Gipsy is included on the authority of 

 Harris. Among the insects in the Jones' cabinet there is no 

 specimen of 0. dinijar with an eighteenth century pin, as there is of 

 Fsilura vwnacha and others near it." The inference, therefore, 

 appears to be that Jones' specimens, like those mentioned by Wilkes, 

 were bred from continental ova, had they been of British origin he 

 would surely have mentioned them in some of the numerous lists 

 that he compiled, and have kept the specimens in his collection. 



Well, Wilkes having set the ball rolling, others were eager to 

 take it up, and so Moses Harris, in " The English Lepidoptera or 

 the Aunlian's Pocket Companion," 1775, a tabulated list of names, 

 times of appearance, etc., gives the "Gipsy" and adds Linnaeus's 

 name " Dis/iar." Berkenhout, " A Synopsis of the Natural History 

 of Great Britain and Ireland," 1795, mentions it as frequent about 

 Ealing, in Middlesex ; and Donovan, " The Natural History of 

 British Insects," 1790, says that it cannot have been "uncommonly 

 scarce about fifteen years ago," as almost every collector has a 

 specimen in his collection, but they majj^ have been bred from ova, 

 and that Harris did so breed it in 1775, but that it never was 

 "frequent about Ealing" ; and that being unable to obtain British 

 examples to figure he had to rely upon German, " which exactly 

 agree with those found in England." Haworth, " Lepidoptera 

 Britannica," 1803, mentions disiiar as " with us very rare." 



This appears to close the first phase in its British history, for 

 nothing se< ms to have been heard of it for some years subsequently. 

 Whether Wilkes's circumstantial account of its artificial introduc- 

 tion in the neighbourhood of Ealing be correct or not, the collectors 

 of about 1773 and the few following years appear to have obtained 

 specimens which they accepted as British, but those of a few years 



