50 VARIETIES OF 



This would appear to be the var. B of Guenee's * Noctuelles ', vol. v., 

 p. 288, where we read : " This is the opposite to the preceding (var. 

 A). The inferior wings are almost as white as in aquilina, even in the 

 $ , with a blackish border, very decided, and divided in its inner half 

 by a white band. The superior wings are very much powdered with 

 white, above all on the costa, extending to the stigmata and the sub- 

 terminal space, but the terminal space is very dark. The thorax and 

 the head are greyish-white." Guenee then goes on to say : " I have 

 taken this beautiful variety in the west of France. I have never seen 

 it in collections nor have authors referred to it." 



E. Ground colour pale greyish-fuscous. 



a. var. fusca, mini. The anterior wings of this variety are of a 

 pale greyish-fuscous, with the transverse lines and stigmata well 

 marked and generally outlined in darker fuscous. The stigmata 

 vary in size and shape, and the row of cuneiform dashes on the sub- 

 terminal line also varies in the amount of development, although this 

 is never, in this variety, so obsolete as in Guenee's siliginis. There is 

 no pale costa. The hind wings are whitish in the males, greyer in 

 the females, but slightly variable inter se in the sexes. This variety is 

 well distributed. 1 have specimens from the coasts of Lancashire and 

 Yorkshire as well as from Deal. This would appear to be Guenee's 

 var. C, of which he writes : " The superior wings a little larger, of a 

 pale greyish-brown, shaded with darker grey, with the lines deeper ; 

 the cuneiform spots not very distinct. Inferior wings equally pale " 

 ('Noctuelles,' vol. v., p. 289). 



/3. var. siliginis, Gn. This variety has puzzled a good many lepi- 

 dopterists, even its nomenclator Guenee, who did not consider it near 

 enough to eruta, Hb. to sink it as that form, consequently he treated 

 it as a distinct species. Zeller's specimens in the British Museum 

 show that the variety is closely allied to var. eruta, having a fuscous 

 ground colour, but with the upper half of the wing strongly dusted 

 with pale greyish- white to below the stigmata ; the transverse lines 

 being very indistinct, except the subterminal, which is pale grey. The 

 hind wings are of a dirty white colour. Guenee writes of it : " Each 

 French author has written this name in his own fashion. M. Duponchel 

 writes "setiginia" M. Boisduval, "segnilis." To the remark I have made 

 on this subject (' Ind.,' 240) I would add, that if a "rectification in the 

 name were necessary, it would probably consist in adopting Hiibner's 

 name, but I am not at all satisfied that his eruta, in spite of its resem- 

 blance to this, is anything but a simple variety oftrititi," (' Noctuelles,' 

 vol. v., pp. 287-288). Staudinger considers siliginis as synonymous 

 with eruta, but it only agrees with it in having no pale costa, in fact, 

 Staudinger considers every var. of tritici without a pale costa as synony- 

 mous with eruta, an evident error. It is really only a sub- variety of 

 var. fusca, differing from it in the fact that, whilst the former has the 

 transverse lines strongly developed, this has them ill-developed or 

 not at all. In this way it is nearest to var. obsoleta in group A, but 

 the colour is very different. 



y. var. costa-fusca, mihi. This is the pale greyish-fuscous form, 

 in which the transverse lines and row of cuneiform spots are well- 

 developed, and differing from var. fusca in the presence of a very 

 distinct costal streak and pale median nervure. It is a common and 



