150 VARIETIES OP NOCTUJB 



siderably in the amount of red in the ground colour. Some specimens 

 are almost as pale as var. pallida, with a slight reddish tinge, others are 

 very grey, and much more suffused. Almost all these pale reddish 

 forms are, however, much mottled in the central area, and about the 

 subterminal line the pale mottlings occasionally having a somewhat 

 ochreous tinge. As a red variety, it bears almost the same relation to 

 var. brunnea, the darkest of the red varieties, as does var. pallida to the 

 dark black-grey type, gothica. It has the dark characteristic gothica- 

 mark, and is a not uncommon form. The sub- var. obsoleta-rufescens, 

 in which the dark gothica-m&rk is obsolete or very pale, is the most 

 common of all the obsolete forms, and is generally known as gothicina, 

 a name belonging to its darker and duller red relative. My specimens 

 of var. rufescens have come from Hereford, Portland, Darlington, 

 Nottingham, Chester, Strood, St. Anne's-on-Sea, Morpeth and Rannoch. 

 My specimens of the obsolete sub- var. have come only from Hereford 

 and Rannoch. 



. var. suffusa, mihi. This form has the ground colour, entirely 

 reddish, with the characteristic dark gothica-maxk well developed. It 

 is very rarety mottled, and is altogether a more unicolorous, as well as 

 redder variety, The reddish sub- variety, in which the gfo^zca-mark 

 is fainter and reddish in colour, has been described as gothicina by 

 Herrich-Schaffer. His special diagnosis is : " Inter stigmata ambo 

 macula quadrata ferruginea." He then adds : " What is black in 

 gothica is rust-coloured in gothicina. I have both sexes from Lapland. 

 The species resembles gothica very much. The size, shape and mark- 

 ings are the same as in that species, the colouring, however, is very 

 different. The ground colour is rust or reddish in the central area of 

 the wing, with slaty-grey discoidals and similarly coloured shading 

 on the costa, with pale transverse lines. There is no trace of black 

 in the gothica-mark. The outer transverse wavy subterminal line and 

 interrupted row of dots on it are ochreous. The hind wings and 

 undersides are brown-grey as in gothica " (' Systematische Bearbeitung,' 

 vol. ii., p. 196, figs. 125-6). This form is not really an obsolete form 

 as we are apt to consider it. Herrich-Schaffer, accustomed to the 

 dark Linnaean type, appears to lay stress, firstly, on the ground colour, 

 secondly, on the red gothica-m&ick. The application of the name 

 gothicina to our pale Scotch specimens with a purely obsolete gothica- 

 mark is therefore entirely wrong, the name being applied by Herrich- 

 Schaffer to a form which appears to be generally distributed in Britain 

 and to be found with the other endless varieties of the species, wherever 

 the species is common. I have specimens of var. suffusa from Hereford, 

 Darlington, Morpeth and Eannoch ; and var. gothicina, in its restricted 

 sense, from the same localities. I have only seen perfectly obsolete 

 vars. from Rannoch. 



. var. rufa, mihi. A bright red form of this species has been 

 sent to me in some numbers by Dr. Chapman of Hereford, but I have 

 not seen it from any other locality except Forres. A sub- var., obsoleta- 

 rufa, also occurs, in which the characteristic black gothica-m&xk is ill- 

 developed in a paler shade of red. I have only one specimen of the 

 obsolete form. 



rj. var. brunnea, mihi. This is a deep reddish-brown form of 

 gothica, much more widely distributed than var. rufa. I have never 

 seen, however, an obsolete specimen of this variety. The ground 

 colour is frequently tinged with purplish, which gives it a very pretty 



