THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 209 



visitor can put up with plain food, and likes to be free from 

 all manner of restraint, and close to the best collecting- 

 ground, he will find the ' Bailey Tavern,' at the summit of 

 the south cliff, very convenient quarters, and the charges 

 less than half those of more pretentious establishments. The 

 windows command a glorious view of Dublin Bay and the 

 Wicklow mountains, and acres of cliff glowing with the crim- 

 son and yellow blossoms of Geranium sanguineura and Lotus 

 corniculatus. 



Edwin Birchall, 

 Bradford, Dec. 1, 1866. 



Variation in Lepidoptei'a. By C. S. Gregson, Esq. 



There seems to be a growing interest in this long- 

 neglected, but most interesting, phase in Lepidopterology. 

 I think the terms " aberrant form," " abnormal form," or 

 " variety," used indiscriminately, cannot be defended ; yet in 

 Lepidoptera, which so often " sport," as botanists would say, 

 it will be found difficult, in practice, to speak correctly if 

 we adhere too closely to the proper terms ; and as many of 

 our very best Entomologists are not scholars, I fear we can- 

 not expect to get the information we want, if we lay down a 

 strict rule to be applied to each — shall I say variety, or shall 

 it be aberration ? If the first, then I take it " variety " should 

 apply to a series of specimens which are allied to, but dif- 

 ferent in size, colour, shape or marking from, a well-known 

 type, it may be from different localities or in different sea- 

 sons ; if the second, then we should apply "aberration" 

 to most insects which are now called varieties ; and this 

 word would be proper to apply to a " fine variety " of Vanessa 

 Urticse in the possession of Mr. Ingall, for it is evidently an 

 abnormal or aberrant form of this abundant, yet in England 

 generally constant, species ; 1 say in England constant, be- 

 cause the Corsican variety ? Vanessa Ichnusa (without the 

 two central spots), is not, in Corsica, a scarce form ; yet after 

 passing my eye over at least a thousand bred specimens 

 nearly every year for the last twenty years, I never met with 

 an English specimen of this form until last year, when I 

 obtained one captured by a little girl at Hawkshead, in North 



