278 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



PHALMNA (BOMBYX) LUBRICIPEDA, Linn. 

 By T. H. BiiiGGs, M.A., F.E.S. 



Mr. KiRBY, in his ' Catalogue Lep. Het.' i. p. 227, published 

 in 1892, and in his ' Handbook to the Order Lepidoptera,' pub- 

 lished in 1897, gives, in my opinion, conclusive proofs that 

 Linnffius, when he described PhaUena luhricipeda, meant our 

 white ermine, commonly known as Spilosoma vientliastri, and not 

 the buff one. Yet all entomological magazines, periodicals, and 

 their contributors from those dates seem entirely to have ignored 

 these publications of Mr. Kirby's.* 



I have not seen the first-mentioned book, but in his ' Hand- 

 book,' vol. iii p. 130, he refers to — 



(i) Bomhyx luhricipeda (Linn.), Syst. Nat. (ed. x.), i. pp. 505-6, 

 No. 47 (1758). 



(ii) Linn., Faun. Suec. ii. p. 303 (1761). 



(iii) Pkalana luhricipeda (iScopoli), Ent. Carn. p. 208, No. 513 

 (1763). 



(iv) Bomhyx luhricipeda alha (Hufnagel), Berlin Mag. ii. p. 412, 

 No. 25 (1766). 



(v) Bomhyx menthastri, Esper, Schmett. ii. p. 334, taf. 66, 

 figs. 6-10 (1786) ; Hiib. Eur. Schmett. iii. figs. 152, 153 (1804?). 



(vi) Phalcena erminea, Marsham, Trans. Linn. Soc. i. p. 70, 

 pi, 1, fig. 1 (1791). + 



(i) Linn. Syst. Nat. (ed. x.), i. pp. 505-6, No. 47 (1758). 



luhricipeda. — P. Bomhyx spirilinguis, alis deflexis alhidis, 

 punctis nigris, abdomineque quinque fariam nigro punctato. 



Larva pilosa, fusca punctis caeruleis, linea dorsali pallida. 



Varietatem /3 non distinctam esse speciem docuit D. De Geer. 



Linnseus refers to — 



(i) ' Fauna Suecica,' p. 254, No. 823 (1746). 



(ii) Goedart, ' Metamorphosis et Historia Naturalis Insect- 

 orum,' tt. 23, 38 (1662-1669). 



(iii) ' List Goedart,' f. 93 (1682). 



(iv) * Eaii Historia Insectorum,' p. 196, No. 155 (1710). 



(v) * Merian Maria Sybilla, De Europische Insecten,' i. t. 46, 

 f. 65 (1730). 



* In this paper I have given verbatim those of the references to which 

 Mr. Kirby refers, as far as I have been able to have had access to the authors 

 he quotes, and also to other works of Linnteus and otlier authors on the same 

 subject not mentioned by Mr. Kirby. It must be remembered that our 

 nomenclature dates from the tenth edition of Linnseus's Syst. Nat. (1758), 

 and also that many of the older authors' descriptions are only useful for the 

 purposes of identification, as most of them are descriptions of insects to which 

 no name was applied by them. 



f This paper was read at a meeting of the Linnean Society on August 5th, 

 1788, but, according to Dr. Staudinger, was not pubhshed by that Society 

 until 1791, and three other references not material to this paper. 



