IN THE BRITISH ISLANDS. 109 



near Perth, I took three black forms of N. glareosa" 



Noctua, Linn., depuncta, Linn. 



The Linnaean description of this species is as follows : " Phalcena 

 Noctua depuncta spirilinguis cristata, alis grisescentibus : lituris mar- 

 ginalibus nigricantibus, strigaque postica punctata." " Media. Alae 

 superiores cinereae sed subgrisescentes : puncta '2 nigra ad basin ; dein 

 puncta 2 sed 3 nigra connata in lituram ad raarginem crassiorem ; turn 

 macula ovata et reniformis ; tandem striga obsoleta obscurior : demum 

 ordo transversus e punctis nigris minutissimis ; margo posticus alae 

 obscurior. Subtus alas pallidse puncto et fascia lineari transversa nigri- 

 cante " (' Fauna Suecicae,' p. 321, No. 1214). Our Forres specimens are 

 more ochreous than the Linnaaan type, so far as the description of the 

 latter allows one to suppose. Hiibner figures our brownish-ochreous form 

 (fig. 502) as mendosa, but his fig. 120 is very different to anything I 

 have ever seen among British depuncta, although both Guenee and 

 Dr. Staudinger agree in referring it to this species. Newman, in his 

 ' British Moths,' p. 844, gives " ochreous-grey " as the ground colour, 

 and I think the Carlisle specimens are occasionally a trifle greyer than 

 the Scotch, although the former are described as " rather bright buff- 

 coloured pale brown shaded with darker brown " in Humphrey and 

 Westwood's 'British Moths,' p. 130, and this is their usual colour. I 

 find, on reference to the Doubleday collection in the British Museum, 

 that the Scandinavian form of depuncta is very unlike ours. The 

 specimens are much larger, of a slaty-grey colour (as in the Linnaean 

 description), with a very faint reddish tinge ; the markings, however, 

 being quite typical. 



a. var. mendosa, Hb. So different is Hiibner's fig. 120, that I 

 think it advisable to give a separate description of it. " The space 

 beyond the subterminal line is rosy red, the ground colour of the re- 

 mainder of the wing reddish-brown with a bright red spot on the costa 

 at the base. The outer transverse line reddish, the elbowed line 

 ochreous, with a black costal point on the inner edge of both these 

 lines ; a dark patch between the stigmata, and another beyond the or- 

 bicular, with two black dots on the abbreviated basal line. Hind 

 wings slaty -grey " (' Sammlung europaischer Schmet.' &c., fig. 120). I 

 cannot but think that this figure is highly coloured, but meant to 

 represent a particularly red specimen of our more ochreous and 

 reddish form, as Hiibner figures in the same work another specimen, 

 quite typical of our British specimens. Of this fig. 502, 1 wrote : " It 

 (mendosa) is a good figure of our North British depuncta, with the ner- 

 vures hardly so faint ; the ground colour of a deep brownish-ochreous, 

 hind wings grey, with a distinct lunule." All our British specimens 

 would appear to be referable to var. mendosa. 



Noctua, Linn., triangulum, Hufn. 



Hufnagel's description of the type is as follows : " The double 

 triangle. Fore wings reddish-yellow or brown, with a large brown spot 

 which represents two triangles meeting at their apices " (' Berliiiisches 

 Magazin,' iii., 306). Gueue'e writes of it : - 4< It is one of the most 

 common species of Noctua. It varies slightly with us in the intensity 

 of the ground colour " (' Noctuelles,' vol. v., p. 330). There are three 

 shades of ground colour found in our British specimens. The first is 

 a very rare form, red in colour = the type ; the second, grey, tinted 



