TRIFID^E. 181 



small portion of the margin slightly tinged with yellowish- 

 brown." A single specimen was said to have been taken 

 at Brixton, London, about the middle of September, 

 1793. 



This insect was subsequently recognised as a North 

 American species, brought to this country either accidentally 

 or otherwise ; and it would have been unnecessary to notice 

 it here but for the curious circumstance of the capture of 

 another specimen some years ago. In the year 1885 the Kev. 

 0. F. Thornewill wrote to The Entomologist that he had seen, 

 in 1878, in the collection of an engine-driver at Nottingham, 

 a remarkable Noctua which he was then quite unable to 

 identify. He says, " I had almost forgotten the circumstance 

 when one day turning over casually the first volume of ' Hum- 

 phrey and Westwood ' I came upon the figure of a moth 

 (Plate 54, Fig. 1) which I at once recognised as the identical 

 insect. This was named Euphasia catena. The collector in 

 whose boxes I saw it informed me that he had himself taken 

 it in a lane near Nottingham ; and from the little store he 

 seemed to set by it, I feel confident that this is a true account 

 of the matter." There can be no reason to believe it to be 

 more than accidentally introduced into these islands.) 



Genus 91. HYDRELIA. 



AntennEe ciliated ; eyes naked, without lashes ; thorax 

 slender, smooth, very flatly crested at the back ; abdomen 

 slender, not crested ; fore wings oblong, much squared, 

 brightly coloured and with abnormal markings; hind 

 wings plain, the cross-bar long, and the cell which it 

 crosses very broad ; vein 5 very slender, attached below the 

 middle. 



Larvae slender, smooth, with the first and second pairs of 

 prolegs either aborted or incomplete. 



We have but two species — very different. 



