Ixx 



appear to let judgment go against them by default. Scarcely 

 have the scales fallen from our eyes, and enabled us to see where 

 the clear-wmged moths ought to be placed, before Mr. Butler 

 draws the Grey Dagger, and calls upon us to surrender at discretion, 

 and make humble confession that under the name Acronycta we 

 have hitherto huddled together representatives of eight genera 

 belonging to four distinct families ; that three-fourths of these 

 so-called Nocture are in truth Bombyces ; that of our English 

 species rumicis and auricoma are Arctiidce ; leporina and aceris 

 are Lijjarldcs ; megacei-)hala, strigosa, and the common dagger- 

 moths, psi and tridens, are Notodontidce ; and that only alni and 

 ligustri areNoctuse, the former being the type of Jocheao-a, whilst 

 the latter is relegated to Mamestra. Such is the result at which 

 Mr. Butler has arrived, chiefly from a consideration of the larval 

 characters,* but relying also upon the wing-venation and structural 



* The larvae of our indigenous species are delineated on plates xxxi. and xxxii. 

 of Wilson's ' Larvffi of the British Lepidoptera.' But the reference on p. 207 

 to plate xxxii., fig. 6, as Acronycta tridens, is a misprint for fig. 1. 



Ochseuheimer, in the Systema Glossatorum Europas, puhlislied in the fourth 

 volume of 'Die Schmetterlinge von Europa' (1810), divided Acronycta into two 

 divisions; A. containing leporina, alni, psi, tridens, and others; B. containing 

 menyantliidis, auricoma, rumicis, aceris, meyacepliala, and others. Ochsenheimer, 

 however, died before he reached Acronycta in the descriptive part of his work, and 

 it was with this very genus that Treitschke commenced his continuation of Ochsen- 

 heimer (Schmett. Europ. v. 3). In the preface he tells us that unfortunately 

 Oehsenheimer's papers gave him much less assistance than he had hoped, that 

 of the descriptions contained in the fifth volume only the genus Acronycta had been 

 worked out, and that in that genus those of leporina, hradyporlna, cuspis, euphorbia, 

 and eiiphrasicB had not been worked out, by Ochsenheimer. After saying that " die 

 Raupen kommen denen der ehemahligen Spinner nahe," Treitschke indicates two 

 divisions: A. Larvae with long hairs, without dorsal tufts ; and B. Larvae with long 

 hairs, with dorsal tufts. Treitschke's A includes seven species, leporina, hradyporina, 

 aceris, megacephala, alni, ligustri, and strigosa ; and his B includes eight species, 

 tridens, psi, cuspis, menyanthidis, auricoma, rumicis, euphorhice, and eupiUrasim. 

 Thus Treitschke's A and B do not agree with Oehsenheimer's A and B, but leporina 

 stands at the head of the division A of each, and it is probably on this ground that 

 Mr. Butler takes leporina as the type of the restricted genus Acronycta, which finds 

 its place in the family Liparidce. In the matter of spelling Mr. Butler appears 

 to prefer Diphtera and Acronicta to Diphtliera and Acronycta ; after twice citing 

 '' Acronicta (sic), Ochs.," he adopts that form on ijp. 316, 317 for the restricted genus, 

 I suppose on the ground of priority. For doubtless Ochsenheimer, in the Catalogue 

 referred to (Schm. Europ. iv. 63, G3), did print or misprint Acronicta and Diphtera 

 (apparently following Hiibner as regards Dlp>htera) ; but when the genera came to be 

 described in 1825 we find the correct spelling Acronycta (Schm. Europ. v. 3) and 

 Diphthera {ih. 47), and, to prevent any mistake, the Greek words from which they 

 are derived. After fifty-five years' use of the right, it is too late to revert to the wrong. 



