VARIATIOX. 267 



is a good and distinct sub-species, having nothing in common with the 

 small specimens oi f estiva which are picked out from hundreds of tl.e 

 larger forms by our Scotch collectors, and distributed broadcast into 

 our English collections as coiifliia. This error was due primarily to 

 Newman, who treated this small race oi festiva as a distinct species 

 under the name of conflua in his British Moths, p. 394, erroneously 

 supposing that these small /estiva were Treitschke's confiua. Of New- 

 man's so-called cotifiua, Mr. Reid of Pitcaple writes: — "There is no 

 difference between the specimens sent out from Aberdeenshire ■\'~, festiva 

 and confiua. Collectors pick out all the small specimens and call them 

 confiua (because it is so in Newman's British Moths ), and all the 

 large ones and call them festiva. They (both large and small) occur 

 together here in all localities, almost from the sea-level to several 

 hundred feet above the sea" {in litt.). I have some two hundred 

 specimens in my series from different localities in Scotland and England, 

 and it is impossible to get from the mainland of Scotland, so far as we 

 at present know, a single form that cannot be obtained occasionally in 

 our Kent woods. Some of my smallest examples are from Kent, and 

 some of my largest from Perth and Aberdeen. Of course, local 

 environment causes some little difference in the appearance of such 

 a common species, and a tendency to glaucous is more frequent in the 

 ^Aberdeen and Darlington districts than elsewhere, the reddest specimens 

 I have ever seen coming from Perth and Chattenden (Kent), widely 

 distant localities enough. True festiva and our forms erroneously 

 called confiua, in their reddest varieties are bright red, more like the 

 red of bright Noctua rubi, but even brighter than the brightest of these, 

 still there is none of the dull-brown colour in these festiva vars. that is 

 charactcrisiic of the true Icelandic and Shetlandic conflua, the reddest 

 of which resemble somewhat in colour the red-brown type of N. baia. 

 These specimens, too, have a differently shaped wing as mentioned by 

 Herr Hoffmann in his extract quoted below% and this is quite a constant 

 character, whilst no Scotch confiua, so-called, exhibit this essential 

 character, whatever their size. That the so-called conflua of Scotch 

 localities are anything more xhzxi festiva, I fail to see, whilst, at the same 

 time, I consider that the Shetland race is so far differentiated that it 

 can be at once separated from any forms oi J estiva known. I treat, 

 therefore, all our English and Scotch festiva as such, dropping altogether 

 Newman's erroneous use of the name conflua, and at the same time 

 treat our Shetland specimens as a distinct sub-species under the name 

 of conflua, Tr. Those who have not the Shetland sub-species will of 

 course find it difficult to follow out the intricate muddle that has been 

 woven round this species, but I believe I can safely say that in no part 

 of the mainland of Great Britain has the conflua of Treitschke been 

 taken, and although undoubtedly some of onx festiva may to a small 

 extent superficially resemble some of the forms of the allied sub-species, 

 there can be no possible doubt in determination. Of the true conflua 

 in Iceland, Dr. Mason writes : — " Very abundant and variable ; this was 

 first described as a species from Icelandic specimens, and differs from 

 the form usually called N. festiva var. cotiflua in British collections from 

 its smaller size j the only British specimens of this form which I have 

 seen were taken by the late John Sang, at Wolsingham in Northumber- 

 land " {Ent. Mo. Mag., xxvi., p, 198); whilst we also read: — "The 



