Insects. 



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among a number of Adonis taken in England which he had purchased. One of 

 these I have seen and it is certainly L. Dorylas, and now that attention has been 

 called to it, the insect will probably be met with in the coming summer. — Henry 

 Doubleday ; Epping, January 12, 1863. 



Occurrence of Ino Geryon in England. — Three years ago when the question was 

 mooted whether we had not a third species of Ino in this country, and whether that 

 species was not Ino tenuicornis of Zeller, I paid considerable attention to the 

 subject, and obtained the loan of specimens from several of my entomological friends. 

 The result however was unsatisfactory, and I failed in my attempts to identify our 

 small species in which the sexes are so similar in size with Ino tenuicornis. More re- 

 cently this little species has been identified by Mr. Doubleday with Ino Geryon of 

 Hubner, and although many entomologists still doubt its distinctness from Ino 

 Statices, still I feel no hesitation in accepting it as a species. The subject has been 

 recently afresh brought before me by Mr. M'Lachlan, who has kindly placed in my 

 hands Dr. Staudinger's little monograph of the genus Ino, published in the Stettin 

 ' Entomologische Zeitung ' for 1882, p. 341. I append a translation of that learned 

 entomologist's observations on Ino Geryon : — "This species is altogether less than Ino 

 Statices, and measures only from 8.5 to 9. inch in the expansion of the wings: in this 

 respect there is scarcely any difference between the two sexes, the male being scarcely 

 inferior to the female in size, and being very much smaller than that of Ino Statices. 

 Compared with those of that species, the antennae of I. Geryon are shorter and stouter 

 in the male. The colour of the fore wings is green more or less glossed with gold ; I 

 have never observed any approach to blue. The hind wings are more transparent 

 than those of I. Statices, and consequently appear somewhat blacker. I am the more 

 inclined to consider I. Geryon a good species since the typical I. Statices is common 

 near Vienna, which is almost the only locality where the real I. Geryon is found, and 

 I am assured by an experienced collector residing there that there must certainly be 

 two species. In the * Transactions ' of the Zoological-Botanical Society for 1852, 

 p. 103, H. Lederer says of Ino Geryon, that Oehsenheimer is wrong when he pro- 

 nounces it to be a small variety of I. Statices, from which it can be distinguished at a 

 single glance; it is true that H. Lederer has since abandoned this opinion, although 

 without assigning reasons for doing so, and has treated them as constituting a single 

 species. The important fact, however, that for many consecutive years the two races 

 have been found unchanged in character at a short distance from each other (I am 

 not aware whether they have been found on exactly die same "spot), is a certain proof 

 that they are distinct as species. The opinion expressed by Oehsenheimer (Bd. iv. 

 p. 63), that I. Geryon might be a generation of I. Statices insufficiently fed, must, 

 on careful consideration, be pronounced erroneous. Half-Starved broods can certainly 

 occur (more frequently when raised in confinement), especially if the food-plant be 

 dried up by the heat, or other casualties of weather induce an earlier emergence from 

 the pupa. But if I. Geryon is only to be found near Vienna in dry places, how comes 

 it that the larvae, led by the well-known and instinctive sense of smell (they frequently 

 know where to find their food-plant even when miles distant), do notsr ek the food (which 

 is the well-known food-plant of Ino Statices) lying so near them? Or, on the other 

 hand, is it to be supposed that these larva? (having no propensity for roving) do not 

 know where to obtain their natural food, by feeding on which they might attain their 

 natural size ; if so, how did these unfortunate insects get to a place where they must 

 be half-starved, notwithstanding which calamity they have managed to maintain an 



