AN ENTOMOLOGICAL HOLIDAY IN S. FRANCE. 147 



Blastobasis lignea Wlsm. + adustella Wlsm. 



" In a single specimen the darker shading is more conspicuous, 

 and the two inner spots are merged in an angulated fascia, leaving 

 the dorsal margin at one-third and tending obliquely outwards to the 

 disc before the middle, where it is angulated back towards the costa 

 from what should be the position of the upper spot ; but, before 

 reaching the costa, it is again bent upwards and slightly outwards 

 to the margin. Abdomen very pale cinereous, the segments marked 

 by narrow greyish fuscous transverse lines. Exp. al. 19 mm." 



Type ? (13697), B.M. (Mus. Wlsm.). 



Hab. Madeira ; one specimen. 



" Intermediate varieties in which the fascia is slightly indicated 

 appear to occur, but I have no specimens before me in condition for 

 comparative description." 



The capture , of Blastobasis lignea Wlsm., in some numbers 

 during the last few years by Mr. A. E. Wright, at Grange-over- 

 Sands (Lancashire), is of extreme interest, as it adds not only a 

 species, but a genus and also a family to our lists. I am not aware 

 that, with the exception of Mr. Wright's specimens, this species has 

 been taken anywhere but in Madeira. The first British specimens I 

 saw belonged to the variety adustella Wlsm., and tended to confirm 

 an opinion held by Lord Walsingham and myself, that the variety, 

 founded on a single specimen, was probably distinct, but the receipt 

 of other specimens from Grange-over-Sands showed that the species 

 was even more variable than we had thought. The variety adustella 

 is an extreme form, but the best one by which to remember the 

 species. Variation from adustella takes place in the loss of the 

 strong markings, such specimens being pale and inconspicuous ; in 

 the other direction a brownish suffusion produces lignea, and some 

 specimens are very dark fuscous (Drnt.). 



AN ENTOMOLOGICAL HOLIDAY IN S. FKANCE. 



By K. G. Blair, B.Sc, F.E.S. 



The insects here noted were collected in the course of a short 

 holiday in the south of France, in May, 1921, in the company of 

 Mr. Hugh Main. The prime object of our trip was the observa- 

 tion, and the photographing in their natural haunts, of the 

 insects that form the subject of the late J. H. Fabre's fascinating 

 series of " Souvenirs Entomologiques," especially of those that 

 cannot be observed in this country. In the short time at our 

 disposal we could not of course hope to discover anything like all 

 of these, and the time of year chosen was too early for many of 

 them, yet the exhaustion of Mr. Main's supply of plates and the 

 running short of our stock of collecting boxes sufficiently demon- 

 strate that we found a very satisfactory proportion of them. 

 Many of the pictorial records of the trip, which were the work 

 entirely of Mr. Main, were on view at the Exhibition of Nature 



