16 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



A CATALOGUE OF THE LEPIDOPTERA OF IRELAND, 

 By W. F. de Vismes Kane, M.A., M.R.I.A., F.E.S. 



(Continued from p. 331.) 



DiANTHCECiA NANA, Rott. — Widely spread and numerous in 

 some localities where Lychnis flos-cuculi, or other food-plant, is 

 abundant. Mr. Tutt, from want of published records, is mis- 

 taken in stating that it has been seldom taken in Ireland (Brit. 

 Noct. vol. iii. p. 86). The Irish specimens have a very dark 

 blackish ground colour, as noted by Mr. Birchall of the specimen 

 sent him by Mrs. Battersby, from Cromlyn, Co. Westmeath. 

 Mr. Tutt notices this under var. suffusa {loc. cit.), erroneously 

 I think. Miss Reynell has also met with the same form in 

 abundance at Killynon, in the same county, and they do not differ 

 from a large series I took at Favour Royal, Tyrone, and else- 

 where. They exactly correspond with a Scandinavian, and only 

 differ from an Auvergne specimen in my collection, in the white 

 patches of the latter being reduced in size. In connection with 

 this it may be interesting to note that Berce (Faune Ent. Fran- 

 Qaise) describes the ground colour as " bluish black," and the 

 white patches conforming in size, &c., to the normal type. We 

 see, therefore, that the reduction of the white traits is not 

 dependent upon a northern latitude, nor the dark colour. The 

 browner tint of British examples would seem to be rather a 

 deviation from the commonest continental form. The var. 

 suffusa, Tutt, occurs at Ballycastle, Co. Antrim, and on the same 

 coast, a little further west, at Magilligan {Curz.), and Sligo (Brit. 

 Noct), but I have not seen this form. I took one specimen of 

 (?) var. intermedia^ Tutt, on the 15th May, at Rathlin I., off the 

 Antrim coast, but it has the dentated ante-marginal line, and 

 some markings on the base and inner margin in dingy whitish. 

 I have seen no approach to the Shetland, Orkney, or Welsh 

 forms with markings more or less obliterated, in Ireland, and 

 consider that the character has probably been developed in the 

 former islands by isolation and protective selection. It may be 

 worth pointing out that some of these specimens show a super- 

 ficial resemblance to D. magnolii, Bdv., where the orbicular 

 remains distinct, and traces on the costa and elsewhere are 

 faintly marked. This seems one of the instances in which a 

 a variety of one species approaches the facies of another. The 

 moth flies long before dusk to the flowers of ragged robin, 

 or species of Dianthus, &c., and is wary and shy of approach, 

 though easily taken when settled. They can fly swiftly when 

 not searching for flowers, and evidently rely rather on sense 

 of smell than on sight, at least while daylight continues; as, 

 when not flying up the wind, they dodge about the herbage as 

 if quartering the ground, without apparently being attracted by 



