IN THE BRITISH ISLANDS. 31 



discovered that the type specimen was not there, and Mr. Kirby told 

 me that they did not possess a great many of the reputed British 

 specimens of this collection, and suggested that my specimen might 

 possibly be the type. Can any one put on record the fate of these 

 reputed British specimens ? The box or drawer containing them did 

 not go to the British Museum with Stephen's British collection. 

 Stephens' type specimen came from the Marsham collection, and was 

 without locality. Now, there is one record of the capture of P. verti- 

 cillata, Gn. (acuta, Walker) in England, viz., that by Mr. H. P. 

 Kobinson, of Tunbridge Wells, in May, 1870. The synonomy of the 

 species must, therefore, be corrected as follows: Plusia bimaculata, 

 Steph. ' 111. Brit. Ent.,' vol. iii., p. 102., P. verticillata, Guene'e, " Sp. 

 Gen. Noctuel.,' vol. vi., p. 344, No. 1168, 1852; Knaggs, < Ent. 

 Annual,' 1871, p. 79. P. acuta, Walker, <B. M. Cat. of Noctuse,' 

 p. 992, 1857; Eobinson, < Ent. Mo. Mag.,' vii., p. 138. This species 

 seems, like others of the genus, to have a very wide distribution, and 

 there are specimens in the British Museum from many parts of Asia, 

 from Africa, and from Australia" ('Ent. Mo. Mag.,' vol. xxvii., p. 163). 

 The whereabouts of the type was soon detected for we read on 

 p. 207 of the same volume of this magazine, the following from the 

 pen of Mr. H. T. Stainton : " The Stephensian specimen of this insect 

 is now in the British Museum. When the Stephensian library was 

 removed here in 1853, along with the books came one solitary book- 

 box, containing a number of Continental specimens of reputed British 

 insects such as Aglia tau, GlupJiisia crenata, &c. I had never looked 

 on the box as containing anything of value, till I read Mr. Mason's 

 note on Plusia bimaculata at p. 163 of this volume. I then referred to 

 this box, and there, sure enough, was the missing specimen, along 

 with several other apparently British specimens of curious Plusice. I 

 lost no time in communicating my discovery to Dr. Giinther, F.B.S., 

 and hearing from him that the Museum would be glad to receive this 

 box of insects, I took it there and handed it to him on the 22nd June. 

 It had been an inmate of this house for 38 years " (' Ent. Mo. Mag.,' 

 vol. xxvii., pp. 207-208). 



Plusia, Och., gamma, Linn. 



In this species, the 7 mark is almost always (as far as my long 

 series is concerned, always) in one piece, and the red coloration is usually 

 confined to a ferruginous patch, sometimes strongly marked, in contact 

 with the lower part of the angulated line, and extending under the 

 y mark. Some specimens also have the extreme outer margin outside 

 the subterminal, very pale, and also the costal patch just outside the 

 reniform. The stigmata are as distinctly marked as in pulchrina. 

 The hind wings of some of the males have the basal area pale, the 

 darker outer margin having then quite the appearance of a marginal 

 band ; the pale central transverse band (conspicuous in the hind wings 

 of jota and pulchrina), becomes merged or extended into a broad paler 

 basal area. Guenee says : " The imago figured by Sepp, is a veritable 

 masterpiece. It is impossible to find a figure which unites to the same 

 extent so many excellent points " (' Noctuelles,' vol. vi., p. 349). He 

 also adds : " In the second edition of Schaffer, this species is coloured 

 in rose, so that it might be mistaken for Plusia iota " (I.e.) ; and again : 



