NONAGRIA EDELSTENI — -A NOCTUID NEW TO THE BRITISH LIST. 291 



that the ordinary form and the dark form had been noted separately, 

 and the latter had been referred to in 1825 as dissolnta by Treitschke, 

 and he.tsii by Boisduval and Herrich-SchJiffer. 



It is true that Treitschke notes, nine years after Ochsenheimer's 

 death, that Ochsenheimer considered specimens " without marks on the 

 underside" to be nenrica, Hb, It is clear that the point can prove 

 nothing scientific, as Hiibner's figure shows no underside, and, in 

 science, what Treitschke says " Ochsenheimer considered," surely 

 cannot carry any weight, as Ochsenheimer himself writes nothing, 

 publishes nothing, on the matter, and, if Ochsenheimer did consider an 

 insect, " without marks on the underside," to be Hiibner's nenrica, it 

 still remains the fact that the upperside of Hiibner's figure carries 

 none of the characteristic marks of edehteni, having neither a " Avhite 

 collar," nor " the white spots along the centre of the wing," most 

 constant features of all the examples captured by Messrs. Wightman 

 and Sharp, as well as those figured by Edelsten (pi. xxi., figs. 1-4). 

 Much stress has been laid on the fact that, in 1869, Staudinger {Stett. 

 Ent. Zt;/., XXX., p. 88) wrote : — 



In Ochsenheimer's collection there is a genuine neurica, Hb., fig. 381, desig- 

 nated as such by a label written with his own hand. Underneath a typical 

 arundineta, Schmidt, is placed, and provided with a label, on which is the 

 following, written in Ochsenheimer's handwriting: ' An eadem cum prfeeedente? 

 sub nomine Xoctua dissoluta.' In Treitschke's collection there are, under the label 

 neurica, five specimens, the first of which is a neurica, Hb., 38L, the second, third, 

 and fourth are aruiulineta, Schmidt, and the fifth is a dark variety oi neurica, Hb., 

 figs. 659-661, subsequently, hessii, Boisd. 



That is (allowing everything for what it has been said Staudinger 

 meant and not what he wrote), 53 years after Ochsenheimer's death, 

 there was a specimen of edelsteni [neurica, Schmidt), with a label on 

 it in Ochsenheimer's handwriting {teate Staudinger), referring it to 

 "neurica, Hb., fig. 381." Now for the purpose of science, one might 

 ask many pertinent questions about a specimen in a man's collection 

 53 years after his death; one might also ask if this specimen was really 

 edehteni, whether it had the "white collar," and the "three white spots 

 along the centre of the wing" after typical examples of edelsteni 

 [ = nenrica, Schmidt), or the dark reniform surrounded by pale ( — arnn- 

 dineta, Schmidt), after the figure of Hiibner, to which Staudinger refers 

 it, and finally, one might then ask whether, if Ochsenheimer did really 

 (by label) refer a specimen of edelsteni, with typical markings, that was 

 in his collection, to neurica, Hb., and erroneously put on it a label 

 which might be considered as expressing an opinion (but published 

 nothing about it) whether it has anything whatever to do with our 

 consideration of Hiibner's figure? This latter is as available to us 

 to-day as to all the entomological authors who rightly referred it to the 

 species that Schmidt renamed arundineta (Treitschke, Duponchel, 

 Boisduval, Herrich-Schiifler, Guenee, Stainton, etc.), and whose 

 synonymy arid conclusions, Schmidt, a collector, evidently without 

 Hiibner's work for reference, so thoroughly upset. 



There are many points in my previous writings that I did not fully 

 appreciate about edelsteni in the flesh, till I saw the very long series 

 exhibited by Mr. Wightman recently at a recent meeting of the Ent. 

 Soc. of London (I had previously only seen a single example shown 

 me by Mr. Edelsten). But, through them all, I have consistently 

 urged and been convinced that neurica, Hb., with the dark reniform, 



