222 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



EREBIA EPIPHRON, ENOCH: ITS SYNONYMY AND 



FORMS. 



By H. Eowland-Broavn, M.A., F.E.S. 



(Continued from j). 199.) 



Herrich-Schaeffer, further (' Syst. Bearb. Schmett. Europ.,' 

 Bd. i, Eegensburp;, 1843), strikes out a new line altogether in 

 his diagnosis of Epiphron under Genus ix, Erebia. 



Figs. 92, 93 and 94 on Plate xx are devoted to the male 

 and the female, and here for the first time not only is the 

 male adequately represented, but we find that the three black 

 spots on the antemarginal band of the underside of the hind 

 wings are actually white-pupilled, though the spots of the fore 

 wings are blind. The female is shown with the same dis- 

 tinctive marks on all the wings, upper and underside alike. 

 Unfortunately the male is figured only for the underside, but 

 in the introductory note of the Group B, Ala, Aniiulis, Riihris, 

 Circa, Ocellos (p. 65), he says : 



" The eye spots in the female sometimes partially pupilled on 

 both sides," and in the detailed description which follows, "small 

 white pupils on the underside at least," while he explains the models 

 from which the figures are drawn — " I have chosen for the underside 

 of the male an example with large spots ; the female is the only 

 one (? form) which I have seen. . . . All the examples of true 

 Epiphron which I have seen were from the Harz. . 



I cannot help thinking, in view of subsequent observations 

 and the testimony of later authorities, that the male figured 

 with the white pupils was an exceptional aberration. Otherwise 

 it is difficult to account for so marked a character having 

 escaped all writers and observers both before and after Herrich- 

 Schaeffer's publication. It will be noted, also, that he does 

 not mention the Vosges as a locality for Epiphron (or indeed, 

 for Cassiope, which he confines to the Austrian, Swiss and 

 South of France Alps), nor is he very copious in the matter 

 of synonymy. Stephens he does not cite ; but to Epiphron he 

 adds, "Cassiope var. ?Boisd." Commenting, also, upon the 

 form of Cassiope, " nach Wood audi in Schottland," he remarks 

 that Wood's description applies only to that species, and not 

 to Epiphron. The reference, I take it, is to William Wood's 

 'Index Entomologus,' published in London in 1839, consisting 

 of 1944 figures of the Lepidoptera of Great Britain. But Wood 

 makes no mention of Cassiope as a Scotch species. " Mts. of 

 Cumberland, June," is all we find here, and Herrich-Schaeffer's 

 mistake suggests that he thought Cumberland to be a Scotch 

 county. 



The year 1844 is further memorable in the history of the 



