98 l^^P'-". 



THE GENUS SCO PARI A. 

 BY EUSTACE K. BANKES, M.A., F.E.S. 



It is, indeed, surprising that Mr. C A. Brings should apparently 

 now claim, in Ent. Mo. Mag., i, p. 50, to have so satisfactorily settled 

 in 18S5, the question as to the specific identity of S. amhif/ualis and 

 atomalis ! For, although on April 22nd, 1885, he wrote (" Entomo- 

 logist," xviii, p. 130), "yet intermediate specimcvs of every possible 

 degree of gi'adation are familiar to us all,'' and now remarks that 

 " any one seeing these intermediate specimens must, 1 think, be driven 

 to the same conclusion as to their identity,'' yet, in " Entomologist," 

 xxii, p. 16, under date December 10th, 1888, we find the following from 

 his pen : " Will none of my brother Entomologists in Scotland assist 

 me in ttwrhing out the question of the specif c identity of S. amhirjualis 

 and atomalis ? Convinced as I am of their identity, I cannot satis- 

 factorily prove it from lack of material. * * and if Entomologists 

 working near the junction of the Highlands and Lowlands toould but 

 collect these species for comparison, the matter ivould speedily be 

 settled. (N.B. — The italics throughout are mine.) However, I would 

 ask your readers to refer, as I have just done, to the papers to which he 

 alludes, contributed by Mr. Briggs to the " Entomologist." Mr. Briggs 

 cannot for one moment suppose that, while using such expressions as 

 " vexed question " and " as has for some time past seemed probable," 

 I, any more than he himself, had the slightest thought of claiming 

 any originality in the view that ambiyualis and atomalis might be iden- 

 tical ; but, having at last the welcome chance of examining a nice 

 variable series from different ])arts of Perthshire, and knowing that 

 some Entomologists, to whom intermediate specimens were by no 

 means "familiar," were still not disposed to accept the idea, I penned 

 my few notes on the matter in the hope that possibly my independent 

 testimony might be useful to th(jse who had also suffered from " lack 

 of material." 



With reference to the second paragraph (p. 51) of Mr. Briggs' 

 note, it v\ould surely have been strange if, when writing with my own 

 revised sketch of the genus before me, I had not briefly alluded to 

 the difficulties which, partly by individual effort, and partly by com- 

 mon consent, have been recently cleared away. 



As regards the qaestion of S. mercurella and cratceyella, I have, 

 in order to oblige Mr. Briggs, made the following attempt to tabulate 

 the chief distinctions between the two species, but owing to the 

 unparalleled range of variation, both in colour and markings, in the 



