IN THE BRITISH ISLANDS. 19 



Plusia, Och., aurifera, Hb. 



This species is mentioned as British by many of our old authors, 

 although there appears no reason to suppose that it is at present a 

 British species. Humphrey and Westwood write of it : " This species 

 measures 1^-inch in the expanse of the fore wings, which are of a pale 

 brown colour with the stigmata and two basal strigae slightly indi- 

 cated ; a greenish-gold patch in the middle of the fore wings, somewhat 

 lozenge-shaped, and dilated beyond the middle into a broad bar 

 extending from the costa almost to the anal angle ; this is followed by 

 a slender yellowish subapical striga. Very rare, if indeed the true 

 P. aurifera be really indigenous ; as the specimen in the British 

 Museum, taken near Dover by the Rev. G. Lyon, has been considered 

 as a singular variety of P. chrysitis. P. aurifera has been described as 

 a native of Spain, Portugal, the South of France, Teneriffe etc. 

 Another specimen, supposed to have been taken near London, was 

 formerly in Mr. Ingpen's collection " (' British Moths,' p. 233). Of 

 what he supposed to be the specimen of Plusia aurifera just referred 

 to as from Mr. Ingpen's collection, Mr. C. G. Barrett writes : " I have 

 recently had the opportunity of examining some insects which, from 

 their great age and their associations, seem to me to be of almost 

 antiquarian, and quite historic, interest. They are in the collection of 

 the Rev. Henry Burney, and were obtained many years ago by his 

 father, in some cases through Mr. Charles Dale, from older collections. 

 Mr. Burney, sen. was contemporary with and corresponded with 

 Haworth, Samouelle, Capt. Blomer, Leach, Curtis, Dr. Abbott and 

 other entomologists of a former generation, and many of their insects 

 ultimately fell into his hands. Although he, unfortunately, did not 

 label them very carefully, he preserved the specimens so well that 

 they are but little faded, and still quite presentable, although from 

 sixty to one hundred years old. Some of them seem to me deserving 

 of a special notice. One is a very beautiful Plusia, obtained sixty 

 years ago from Mr. Charles Dale, who had it from the collection of 

 Dr. Abbott, a rather noted collector at the end of the last century ; it 

 is, therefore, from ninety to one hundred years old, and is set in the 

 rather drooping manner which seems to have been favoured by our 

 early predecessors with the costal margin of the fore wings hardly so 

 forward as the head. This specimen is Plusia aurifera, Hb. ; it is 

 figured very accurately by Noel Humphreys, as a British species 

 (Westwood and Humphrey's <Brit. Moths/ p. 233, plate 52, fig. 5) on 

 the following grounds : ' Supposed to have been taken near London, 

 in Mr. Ingpen's collection,' with the mention of ' one in the British 

 Museum, taken near Dover by Rev. G. Lyon, considered as a singular 

 variety of PL chrysitis.' There is nothing to indicate whether the 

 present specimen is the 'same as was formerly in Mr. Ingpen's col- 

 lection, or another ; its name even had not been preserved ; its main 

 interest lies in the fact that it is an ancient representative of a species 

 formerly supposed to be British, and which may actually have been 

 so, and have become extinct. Some colour is given to this supposition 

 by the statement of Westwood that it was, at the date of his work 

 (1840), ' a native of Spain, Portugal, the South of France, and Teneriffe,' 

 while Staudinger now only gives as a locality the ' Canaries,' as though 

 it were gradually retreating southwards " (' Ent. Mo. Mag.,' vol. xxv., 



