CURRENT NOTES. 201 



SURRENT NOTES. 



Dr. Knaggs has finished his " decoy " article in The Entomologist in 

 the most apjDroved " bird catching " fashion. He has further put it to 

 practical test by catching a specimen of Pieris rapce. 



Mr. W. F. de V. Kane, in his " Catalogue of the Lepidoptera of 

 Ireland," questions the general occurrence of Coenonympha typhon var. 

 laidion in Ireland. This may be correct, but a comparatively long 

 series in our collection from Sligo, are entirely of a very pale colour, 

 with poorly ocellated spots. Mr. Kane mentions having only met 

 with single specimens at Sligo. This would jioint to a localisation of 

 special forms in Ireland, as complete as is the case in Great Britain. 



Lord Eendlesham reports six more Sphinx pinastri from the same 

 locality as last year, and Plusia moneta is recorded from Dorking and 

 Tunbridge Wells. It is to be trusted that collectors this year will not 

 help those who purchase large numbers of European pupae of these 

 species, to exchange their specimens as British. Last season quite a 

 number (some dozens) of S. pinastri and Deilephila enphorbice were sent 

 out in exchange as British, the former, rejiuted captures in the New 

 Forest and Suffolk, the latter in Devon. Our collectors must know 

 that only Lord Eendlesham, and at most three or four other collectors 

 (all of a class who never exchange insects) are the only j^ersons who 

 take S. pinastri, and that D. euphorbia', with the exception of an occa- 

 sional immigi-ant, has not been British for some three-quarters of a 

 century. 



It is with the gi-eatest regret that we have to announce the death 

 of Herr Fritz Eiihl, the President of the International Entomological 

 Society, Editor of Societas Entomologica , probably almost as well known 

 in Britain as on the Continent. 



A most interesting paper on Dasychira pudibunda ab. concolor, Stdgr. 

 is published in the current No. of Societas Entomologica, p. 50. 



We are indebted to Mr. Cockerell for a most interesting account of 

 the "army worm" ravages in the United States, from the St. Louis 

 Daily Globe Democrat, of June 11th, 1893. This contains a siimmary 

 of the pi'evious injurious visitations of Leucania unipuncta in the United 

 States, together with many local rej^orts from Illinois of the damage 

 being done this year to corn crops. Special attention is directed to 

 the fact that the " army worm " that injures the corn is Leucania 

 unipuncta, whilst the "army worm" that injures the cotton is Heliothis 

 armigera. 



It is really surprising that with seventeen names on the cover of the 

 British Naturalist, there appears to be no one competent to edit the 

 material appearing therein under the name of " Entomological Nomen- 

 clature." We recently called attention to the ridiculous errors into 

 which Mr. Dale had fallen in attempting to set Kirby and Staudinger 

 right, and to his abuse of the Latin of the older authors. His remarks 

 on the name bellargtis, are marvellous. In these, Mr. Dale poses as an 

 opponent of " nonsense " names. Mr. Dale says, " Argus was the 

 hundred-eyed guardian of Juno. ' Belle ' is a French word signifying 

 'beauty,' as La Belle Isle," thus wishing us, I suppose, to assume that 

 bellargtis is partly French and partly Latin, in other words, that 

 bellargus is a corruption of " belle argus." What nonsense Mr. Dale 



