group of specimens that we may have in our collections are genuine 

 natives or not, unless they show some marked peculiarity, is matter 

 of little scientific importance; the point that is of importance is, are 

 we right in including Great Britain as within the natural geo- 

 graphical range of the species '? 



In a very serviceable little book published in 1896, on the cover 

 of which we find the legend " The Common Moths of England," 

 but which is probably better known to you by its title page 

 inscription " British Moths," by J. W. Tutt, F.E.S., we read at 

 page 87 " The Gipsy Moth {Ocneria dhpar). — This species has no 

 place whatever in our indigenous British fauna." Is this really so? 

 So long as I can remember, and I doubt not for many years before 

 I was born, Ocneria dispar, as a British insect, has been looked 

 upon with a certain amount of suspicion. Probably this was 

 engendered by Wilkes' circumstantial account of its attempted 

 introduction by artificial means, but according to his own showing 

 the attempt failed within a very short space of time, apparently a 

 matter of a couple of years or so. It is also well known that many 

 attempts have been made within recent years to re-establish the 

 species by turning out large numbers of ova, larvfe and pupa? in 

 various parts of the country, and it is by no means improbable that 

 some of the records of recent captures may have resulted from such 

 attempts, but so far as we know all such attempts have ended in 

 almost immediate failure. Does it then seem reasonable to suppose 

 that any artificial introduction would result in the abundance of the 

 species, that there undoubtedly was, in the fen districts for man}^ 

 years '? Is it not far more probable that the species established 

 itself there under natural conditions and prospered, until some 

 untoward circumstance occurred which rendered its further existence 

 there impossible ? What the particular circumstance that caused 

 its extinction may have been we know not, but it is significant that 

 this species and another — Chn/s^np/ianus dispar — -disappeared from 

 the fen districts, so far as can be gathered from known records, 

 within a year or two of one another, leaving us to deplore them as 

 lost, but none the less, British species. 



An interesting discussion followed, in the course of which Mr, C. 

 B. Williams said that in America, where the species was always 

 more or less common and had at times become a serious fruit-tree 

 pest, its economy had been carefully studied for many years. It was 

 noted that at one time a restricted area would be devastated by it 

 while the surrounding country was comparatively free from its 

 attacks, and it would then appear in profusion in some other district. 

 This led to very careful investigation, in the course of which it was 

 definitely proved that the young larvie were carried on the wind; in 

 one notable case it was shown that vast numbers of young larvie 

 were thus transported from one place where they were abundant to 

 another previously free from them, eleven miles distant across an 



