148 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



not appear to be ascertained, but I presume the fact is 

 unquestionable. Newman says that we may come across one at 

 a flower any time from January to December, but there is, I 

 think, only one brood yearly, oviposition taking place in the 

 spring. — J. R. S. Clifford ; Cambrian Grove, Gravesend, 

 December 11, 1884. 



On the Identity of certain Agrotid^. — I quite concur 

 with Mr. Tutt's remarks (Entom. xviii. 94) as to Agrotis aquilina 

 and A. ohelisca being onW variant forms of one and the same 

 species, of which A. tritici is the type. Some foreign entomolo- 

 gists believe that A. nigricans is also only a form of tritici, an 

 opinion which at present I am not inclined to share. However, 

 the genus Agrotis seems to have been a puzzle to most 

 lepidopterists ; and in the ' European Catalogue of Lepi- 

 doptera,' by Dr. Staudinger and M. Wocke (1871), it forms a 

 stupendous genus, only divided by letters, and containing 172 

 species, many of which English lepidopterists would view as 

 distinct genera. A. strigula, Thnb. {ijorphyrea), commences the 

 genus, and then is included subrosea, which is given as a British 

 species only (Anglia oUm) ; then follow our familiar yellow- 

 underwings, ianthina in the letter d, and one other species in the 

 E group ; besides nihi, umhrosa, dahlii, hrunnea, festiva, cinerea, 

 segetum, exclamationis, corticea, puta, nigricans, tritici, ohelisca, 

 pr(ecox,prasina {Aplecta herhida), and occulta [Aylecta occulta), &c. 

 By the above we see that he retains as good species, tritici, 

 nigricans, and ohelisca, but sinks aquilina as a synonym of tritici. 

 In Ent. Mo. Mag., vol. xix., p. 278, Mr. Warren says:— "One 

 summer, many years ago, I beat out of some ivy, which covered 

 the wall of a garden in the town, a great variety of Noctuse, and 

 amongst them numerous specimens of Agrotis nigricans, tritici, 

 and two each of aquilina and ohelisca. I remember having been 

 much surprised at the time at the occurrence of the last two 

 species, the examples of which I still possess." Mr. Warren 

 then proceeds to give a translation from the ' Jahrbiicher des 

 Nassauischen Vereins fiir Naturkunde,' xxxiii., xxxiv., 1880- 

 1881, p. 87. This notice is too long to give in its entirety, 

 but the following are some extracts, from which it appears that 

 Dr. Adolf Bossier, the author of ' Die Schuppenfliigler des Kgl. 

 Begierungsbezirks Wiesbaden und ihre Entwicklungsgeschichte,' 

 believes tritici, aqailina, ohelisca, and nigricans to be one and 



