COLLECTING NOCTUID^ BY LAKE EKIE. 123 



upon a so-called " type." In the third place, I saw the type of absorptalis 

 in place, before being shifted b}' Mr. Butler, and pronounced it to be 

 Epizeuxis aemnla. What certainty is there that the present " rubbed " 

 example is really Walker's " type " of absorptalis ? In another case I 

 have positively proved tliat the specimen, now figuring as the "type" 

 of Acronycta cristifera, is not Walker's original specimen seen and 

 described by me, and that, almost as i)ositively, the present specimen, 

 shown as Walker's '' type " of crhtlfera, is one he had determined as 

 Mamestra brassicae from a different locality ! One other quotation and 

 my Schmerzenssclirei, as the Germans call it, is ended. After discussing 

 the merits, or rather demerits, of Walker's names Hi/amia and Legna 

 (neither of which has a leg to stand on), to rejjlace my Sparyaloma, 

 Mr. Smith says: "Sparyaloma is antedated in any case." This shows 

 the animus which has guided the whole encpiiry, and which has resulted 

 in cutting down the nearly 8U0 species of North American Noctuidae, 

 originally described by me, to about 650. But I shall retain both 

 Litognatha nubilifascia and Mainestra hibens, for I have shown the reason.* 

 Pardon, oh gracious reader, this digression into the battlefield of 

 nomenclature I I will take thee back to my camp and my quiet. Here at 

 least one can enjoy, with Rousseau and Bernardin de Saint Pierre, un 

 bonheur negatif. Here we can contemplate, as from a solitude, the 

 storms which shake the rest of the world. Here, between the leaf and 

 the air, opens a vista, of the existence of wliich few dream. " Cease 

 sighing, Cytherea," says Bion, "and conquer your sorrows for to-day, 

 since the coming year will afresh demand j^our grief and your tears I " 

 In June, not only Noctuidae but also Sphingidae came to my lure. 

 There were several si^ecies which applied tliemselves more or less closely 

 to the bait, and fell to my net or bottle. The species which stood off 

 the farthest, and yet had its shai'e, was Phlegethontius cehus, with its 

 long tongue. But these were not my largest visitors, for Flying Squirrels 

 (Sciuropterus volans) were also surprised b}' me industriously licking off 

 the " sugar." The light from my " bulls-eye " seemed to blind them. 

 They flattened against the tree-trunk, spreading out their sailed feet, 

 turning their heads, and lifting their bead-like eyes towards the blind- 

 ing light. I caught two of them in my butterfly net, and kept them in 

 a wooden box-cage in my tent for a day or two. They appealed to me 

 for liberty and I let them go again gladly, giving them ever afterwards 

 free tickets to my sweets. I also had visitors still higher uj) in the scale 

 of nature. Some Indians, from the Reservation near by, paid me a 

 cold call. These did not come to " sugar," reconnoitering jierhaps for 

 whisky. They were of the peaceful, half-civilized kind, who, if we are to 

 believe recent statisticians, are actually increasing in numbers, and whose 

 fate is thus quite different from those of Mr. Lo and his kind, who are 

 being perpetually driven from their hunting-grounds by the pale-face — 

 in the books— and who are undoubtedly l)adly treated by white con- 

 tractors in the West. Still, though clad in " store " clothes, with 

 " store " shoes on their feet, having parted with pipe, wampum, toma- 

 hawk and moccasins, tliey belonged clearly to a different race, taciturn, 



* We quite agree with our contributor's indignant protest. We need only 

 refer our readers to Mliat we wrote some time ngo in ^tray Xotcs on Noduo, 

 both on the British Museum descriptions and methods. Who is likely to name 

 insects correctly ■' The man who has seen and caught hundreds of a species ? oi' 

 the man who got liis knowledge from nmseum types ? — Ed. 



