SCIENTIFIC NOTES. Tt> 



. brought hero, aud said Avere captured by . . . were 

 British. I looked at them with a lens, and believe that they had all 

 been re-set.' And later, he wrote that they were 'gross impostures.' 

 This opinion became general, and the name osseata disappeared from 

 onr cabinets and lists" {Ent. Mo. Mag., vol. xxix., p. (56). At this 

 time, then, we had — jnst after the time of the introduction of these 

 foreign examjjles — reached a point, Avhere the species known (though 

 only to British lepidopterists) as " the true osseata,'" was not recognised 

 as a British sjiecies, and from this standpoint of information I wrote 

 my note in The Entomologist, and showed that osseata, Hb. was a 

 species not distinct from ours ; and that, if the Continental humiliata. 

 Hufn. Avas the same as osseata, Hb., as per Staudinger and Wocke's 

 Catalog, then we had only one species in Britain, viz., humiliata, Hufn., 

 (^=osseata, Hb. =^ interjcctaria, Bdv. = dibitaria, Hb. ?). Here I left 

 it, and my contention being based on actual facts from the various 

 authors' Avritings and figures is unanswerable. Mr. Hodges has now 

 turned up a species, which Mr. Barrett says is the true osseata, Hb., 

 and he heads a communication to the Ent. Mo. Mag. -. — '' The recent 

 occurrence of the true Acidalia osseata, Hb., in Britain." Mr. Barrett 

 eannot have looked up the literary matter in the works of Hufnagel, 

 Hiibner, Guenee, etc., or he would not go on perpetiiating such a 

 })alpable blunder. Osseata, Hh, is undoubtedly the red-costa form of 

 (Uir common interject aria. It has broad ample wings, characteristic 

 interjectaria lines, and fails in every distinguishable point that Mr. 

 Barrett lays stress on in his note, " the more pointed wings, strigfe 

 more oblique," being, in fact, not only not present, but intensified in 

 the opposite direction in Hiibner's figure, " the ajiex being particularly 

 rounded, the outer margin jiarticularly square, and the strigai particu- 

 larly straight." The only common featiire is the red costa. Staudinger 

 1 know, makes osseata, Hb., a synonym of humiliata, but that is un- 

 doubtedly an error (and a very allowable one) due to Staudinger's 

 evident ignorance of our common interjectaria sometimes having such a 

 mode of variation. There really ajipears to be a second species on the 

 (Jontinent, and humiliata appears to be the name by which this narrow- 

 winged species is known there, but I am not sure that the new Britisli 

 species which Mr, Hodges undoubtedly introduces for the first time is 

 the same as this, as all the German humiliata I have received have been 

 our common interjectaria. But, accepting Mr. Barrett's dictum that 

 the real humiliata of Continental collections is what he calls osseata 

 where is the necessity for perpetuating a gross blunder in referring 

 to it a name that belongs to another species. Is it because Ave are 

 such scientists as to take the German dealers' types in faith, and 

 are more or less incapable of Avorking out original matter from authors 

 for ourseh'es ? The energetic Avay avc refer to specimens from Conti- 

 nental dealers Avithout CA'er testing their conclusions, and then base our 

 arguments on their most jirofound ignorance, is beyond my comjjre- 

 liension. If Ave are to do science, let us go to the fountain head, and 

 not perpetuate Continental eri'ors by comi^arison Avith so-called German 

 '• types." Mr. Barrett makes another \'ery unsatisfactoiy remark, 

 considering the certainty expressed in the title of his note. He says : 

 " In all these respects, they (Mr. Hodges' sjjecimens) agree accurately 

 Avith Continental specimens of osseata (so-called, as they are sent as 

 humiliata, unless Ave send for specimens in the synonymie name — 

 .1 .W.T.), but are not more than from one-half to tAvo-thirds the size of 



