I . BRITSIH LEPIDOPTE ... 



Original description. — Phalaena Tinea (iclienclla femina aptera 

 laevi nigra. Habitat in Lichen ca Mario super muros teinpli Waxa.- 

 lensis. Larva habitat intra folliculum. Descr : Femina magnitudine 

 vix Cimicis, nigra, tota glabra. Mas repertus non fuit, nee e larvis, 

 cum feminis, produit (Linne, Fauna Suecica, p. 370, no. 1451). 

 Femina aptera laevis nigra. Habitat in Lichene candelario super muros 

 et rupes intra cucullum ; plures larvas exclusit, nullas alatas pbalaenas 

 obtinuit. T. Bergman (Sys. Nat., xiitb ed., p. 899, no. 452). [De 

 Viliers adds (Ent. Linn., ii., p. 494) : In Gallia circa Lugdunum non 

 rara.] 



Historical notes on . Solenobia lichenella. — The lichenella of 

 Linne has been practically obsolete since 1802, but it is the name to 

 which, for many years, almost all authors have referred any Solenobia 

 of which the male has been unknown, and the female has produced 

 parthenogenetic progeny. Reaumur's " Teigne dont le fourreau est a 

 trois pans presque plats " {Mem., hi., p. 185, pi. xv., figs. 7-8) has 

 teen referred here, as also Geoffroy's " Tinaea lapidum, involucro 

 triangulari " (Hist, des Ins., ii., pp. 204-5), which he afterwards named 

 Tinea lapidosa. There is nothing to be said against Eeaumur's insect 

 being so referred, but Geoffroy's owa references to Reaumur show that 

 he mixed up the latter author's account of two or three distinct 

 species, and it is doubtful whether any part of Geoffroy's description, 

 other than the larval case, refers even to a Solenobia. Guenee's 

 jMrella was based on the descriptions of Reaumur and Geoffroy, the 

 insect being unknown to the author. With De Geer's lichenella (Mem. 

 Hist. Ins., ii., pp. 380-6) = trigono-tubulosa, Retz. = lichenella, Zell., 

 Ids, 1839, p. 302, commences the real attachment of lichenella to a 

 parthenogenetic species. Whether the descriptions of Reaumur and 

 Linne really refer to De Geer's lichenella is doubtful, equally so, of 

 course, whether they refer to the lichenella of Speyer (Stett. Ent. Zeit., 

 1847, p. 18) and of von Siebold (Ibid., 1851, p. 343), although there can 

 be little doubt that the lichenella of De Geer, Speyer, and von Siebold 

 are identical. Wocke, in the Cat. Eur. Lep., p. 269, refers the 

 lichenella of Zeller (Linn. Ent., vii., p. 353) to the pineti of Zeller 

 (Ibid., p. 340), which may or may not be correct, but there is no 

 evidence to show that Zelier's lichenella of the Linnaea Entomolocjica 

 (p. 353) is the "forma ? parthenogenetica " as Wocke infers, for 

 Zeller expressly states in his account of the insect that " though the 

 females laid eggs without pairing, the eggs entirely failed to hatch." 

 It is, therefore, doubtful whether Zelier's lichenella (Linn. Ent., vii., 

 p. 353) is the lichenella of Speyer and von Siebold, and Zeller cer- 

 tainly offered no evidence that his insect was a parthenogenetic form 

 of S. pineti. [We have already shown (ante, pp. 158-160) that Hofmann's 

 suspicions in this direction are far from conclusive.] On the other 

 hand, the lichenella of Zeller, Isis, 1839, p. 302 (excluding the $ 

 from Berlin), probably does refer to the lichenella of Speyer and 

 von Siebold, whilst there is little doubt that Snellen van Volienh oven's 

 triquetrella is to be referred here. The facts relating to lichenella have 

 been much obscured by different observers, and the evidence as to its 

 specific value (as one or more species) is most unsatisfactory. Of 

 recent authors, Wallene;ren considers (Bih. Svensk. Vet. Ah. Handl., 

 iii., (5), p. 32, no. 4) that the lichenella of Zeller is the lichenella of 

 Linne, and the ci\dence of a Scandinavian author on the native 



