1 892.] 



THE BRITISH NATURALIST. 



55 



a show of authority. 



No one in this country has been more active than Mr. Tutt in 

 reducing gueneei to varietal rank, and yet his remarks on this variety 

 do not in the least accord with the original description of the insect. 

 In his table of the variation of L. testacea, var. gueneei is referred to as 

 "pale greyish-white, with some of the markings indistinct;" the 

 colour, in fact, is the same as that of var. ohsoleta in the same table. 

 Further on he says the insect is "of an extremely pale ground colour 

 as in var. ohsoleta, but differing from that variety in having most of 

 the characteristic markings of testacea more distinctly marked owing 

 to the paler ground colour." It would seem then, from the context, 

 that although ohsoleta is "an extreme pale" form; var. gtteneei, Tutt, 

 is still paler. The original description of ^z^^;^^^/, Doubleday, (" Ent. 

 Ann.," 1884) is "anterior wings pale, testaceous, irrorated with black 

 and white dots," etc. Again, a var. of L. testacea from Abbot's 

 Wood: — "Very pale grey, with a few very indistinct black costal 

 markings, all the markings of testacea faintly marked, the three 

 stigmata traceable although indistinct, hind wings pale grey," is 

 thought by Mr. Tutt to be "undoubtedly this variety," i.e. gueneei. 

 Apart from the colour test in these cases, neither this last specimen 

 nor either of the others mentioned by him agree with the description 

 of gueneei. • I will not, however, ask, as Mr. Tutt has done in a 

 parallel instance, how these specimens can be referred to gueneei? 

 because I am inclined to admit, although I have not seen them, that 

 they may possibly be modifications of that form. 



Returning to nickerlii, I may say that until Mr. Tutt can produce 

 something more conclusive than his mere opinion, formed apparently 

 on insufficient material and expressed in a hurry ; or someone else 

 convinces me that 1 am in error, I shall continue to regard Freyer's 

 insect as a form of L. testacea and Mr. Baxter's specimen as inter- 

 mediate between that form and o-wi^/z^t'/. —Richard South, London 

 February 8th, 1892. 



V. CARDUi AT Cape Wrath, Sutherlandshire. — In July last I 

 had the pleasure of spending nearly three weeks in Sutherland. I 

 travelled from Lairg in the south, to Durness in the far north, and 

 from there I wandered at my leisure along the wild Pentland coast 

 till I reached Thurso in the distant east. I left with the prospect of 

 doing a good stroke of entomological work, but I am sorry to say 

 that during almost all the time I was away the weather was wet and 

 stormy, and consequently insects were extremely scarce. One dry 

 day a friend and myself were standing on a headland near Cape 

 Wrath, watching a shoal of whales which were sporting in the firth 

 below us, when a briglit object fluttered out towards the water, 



