IN THE BRTTTSTT ISLANDS. 3f) 



with a slight greenish-yellow tint, reniform and orbicular surrounded 

 with black, also the two transverse lines. Mr. McArthur writes : 

 ' The nana are all dark. The ordinary form does not occur, though 

 some specimens are lighter than those I sent.' The figures in the 

 1 Entomologist,' 1880, Plate iv., figs. 12-13 represent light forms. 

 Their colour, compared with those I have, is too yellowish. This var. 

 appears peculiar because a simple dark shading is not prevalent. 

 Even the darkest specimen does not show the brown-black colour of 

 the normal type which contrasts so deeply with the white. The 

 dark parts appear much lighter, paler lead-grey, and the white is 

 tinted with greenish yellow, the colours evidently meeting each 

 other to produce more uniformity " (' Stett. ent. Zeit.,' 1884, pp. 363- 

 364). Of these Dianthoecia conspersa from the Shetland Isles, 

 Mr. J. Jenner Weir writes : " All the specimens are very much darker 

 than the ordinary colour of the species, and some are almost black and 

 quite devoid of markings, resembling very much in their dull leaden 

 hue, D. ccesia " (' Entomologist,' vol. xiii., p. 290). Mr. Gregson 

 writes : " From twelve young conspersa larvae from Hoy, I have 

 bred ten fine perfect specimens, not one of which could be 

 recognised as conspersa at first sight. They have neither the dark 

 nor light colours and markings of conspersa ; they are all more 

 ochreous-brown and yellow, some with rather lighter markings ; two 

 are bright ochreous-yellow, without any light markings,*in fact, they 

 are in pairs, so that placed five and five, no difference could be 

 observed or choice made between them " (' Young Naturalist,' vol. vi., 

 p. 263). Of Dianthcecia conspersa from Unst, Mr. Weir writes : 

 " These are all of the true Shetlandic coloration, but lighter ; some 

 with the markings nearly obliterated, and of a dark leaden-brown 

 colour " (' Entom.,' vol. xvii., p. 3). Of the variation in Welsh 

 specimens of this species, Mr. Gregson writes : " In July 1885, I 

 took a few Dianthoecia conspersa larvae near Llangollen, and from these 

 larvae I bred five good specimens, every one of which is so different 

 from the type which I have taken at Penmaenbach (North Wales), 

 Isle of Man, Cumberland, Westmoreland and North Lancashire, and 

 also from the wonderful ochreous variety of it which I bred from 

 Mr. Curzon's larva? from Hoy (see ' Young Naturalist,' 1885-6), and 

 which I then called ' var. ochrea,' that I have determined to describe 

 these as Dianthoecia conspersa, var. albimaculoidce. Ground colour cold 

 deep brown, thorax dark grey, shoulder marks (first striga) only just 

 indicated, many wavy black markings on the disc, and seven or eight 

 black marks on the costa, and along the hind-margin, the broad arrow- 

 heads are black, the first stigma, like that of albimacula, is round, 

 white, with a dark centre, the exact colour of the ground of albimacula, 

 as is also the filling in between the black wavy lines, the second 

 stigma is lost just as in albimacula, and the usual white marks in 

 typical conspersa are merged into brown in var. albimaculoidce. I may 

 say that I received some D. conspersa larvae in 1886 from Mr. Curzon, 

 when he was in Shetland (on Mainland) ; these produced six specimens, 

 five perfect and one injured, identical with my Welsh variety, albimacn- 

 loidw. The specimens of D. conspersa var. obliterce, first taken by 

 Weaver, in Perthshire, and which were mistaken by Newman (see 

 ' Zoologist ') for barret-tit , are rich, full ochreous-brown without any 



