nictitans group of the Genus Hydroecia. 739 
When he published his work on “The Variation of the 
British Noctuidae,” British entomologists were still content 
to recognise as one single species all the various forms 
which they called H. nictitans. He, in the first volume 
(1891), tentatively suggested that under this name we 
had really two, if not three, different species: and actually 
separated the forms paludis, Tutt, and lucens, Frr., as 
sub-species, from niectitans, L. 
In 1895 (“Entom. Record,” vol. vii, p. 78), he published 
an article, nominally by T. Acton, but actually by himself, 
under the title, “ Varieties of Noctuidae at Warrington,” 
in which he deals again with these puzzling forms, and 
states that further information supported what he had 
written and to a large extent had emphasised the dis- 
tinctness of nictitans, paludis, and lucens. 
Dr. J. B. Smith in 1899-1900 published his paper dealing 
with the North American Hydroecias,* and figured the 
“clasps” (“valves”) of thirty-six species, thirty-five 
American, and one which he calls nictitans. The figure 
is not of sictitans, but probably lucens, or possibly paludis. 
He writes of nictitans, but does not give the faintest in- 
dication that he has heard that Tutt had already stated 
his conviction, that European nictitans could be differenti- 
ated into three probable species. Nor is an American, 
who might be excused, the only writer who has appeared 
ignorant of what has been done and suggested by Tutt 
in this investigation. Dr. Smith says of the American 
species, “These species, which have in the past been 
considered as identical with European nictitans, agree in 
trigonate, pointed primaries, which are in general a shade 
of brick-red, and in which the outer margin is even. In 
general maculation all are alike, having all the usual lines 
and spots, and none of them strongly contrasting. The 
lines are a deeper shade of red-brown, and the transverse 
posterior line is geminate, the inner portion crenulate or 
lunate, the outer even. The ordinary spots may be yellow, 
white or concolorous, within the limits of the same species, 
but there are no other white shadings. In the common 
Eastern species there is no one prominent feature, and the 
secondaries are reddish or smoky. This, from its general 
* Contributions towards a monograph of the Noctuidae of Boreal 
North America. Revision of the Hydroecia, Gn., by J. B. Smith. 
Transactions of the American Entomological Society, vol. xxvi, 
1899-1900. 
