io8 



THE BRITISH NATURALIST. 



[May 



madder), most distinct on the gth to 12th segments. Comparing the 

 Folkestone larvae with the full description taken from those sent me 

 by Mr. Gregson, I found that they agreed in every particular. I 

 admit that the perfect insects bred from Mr. Gregson's larvae are 

 more strongly marked, and perhaps smaller, than imagines from the 

 Folkestone larvae ; but as the forms are so identical in their early 

 stages I could not agree with Mr. Gregson as to the distinctness of 

 his insect" (" Entomologist," Vol. XXIII., p. 98). Having thus 

 settled in his own mind that hipunctidactyla and plagiodactyhis were the 

 same species and that scabiodactyhis was simply a local form of the 

 former, it is amusing, though unsatisfactory, to find Mr. South in the 

 November number of the " Entom.," some six months after, 

 redescribing the larva and figuring the species as plagiodactylus, 

 without any reference to the correct name hipunctidactyla. Mr. 

 Gregson's original note, on the probability of the form with the inner 

 margin ochreous being distinct, is as follows : — " At page 186 of the 

 Entomologist " for December, 1866, appears a life-history of 

 Pterophorus plagiodactylus, written by myself, but, as subsequent 

 discoveries of " plume " larvae have confirmed me in the opinion that 

 the species there described is not the plagiodactylus of our Continental 

 friends, their plagiodactyhis having a perfectly distinct larva from the 

 species I discovered feeding mt^od. Scahiosa columbaria, I have given it 

 the name of scabiodactyhis. I have long suspected the hipunctidactyla, 

 Haw. of tne older English cabinets, was identical with or very nearly 

 allied to the ■plagiodactylus of Continental collections. A little care in 

 that direction will, 1 think, prove that we have also another nearly- 

 allied species in that group, — larger, stronger and darker, and sitting 

 with its wings slightly deflexed, and the hind legs carried straight 

 out in repose. This supposed species stands in my collection as P. 

 Jiinindodactyliis. I have made figures of a plume-larva which I 

 discovered, where I took the perfect insect : the larva is distinct 

 from any species I know, but as I did not breed the perfect insect the 

 matter must remam an enigma " (" Entomologist," IV., pp. 363- 

 364). I believe hinmdodactylns never got further than this, and 

 scabiodactylus and plagiodactyhis are now merged into hipiincty dactyl a as 

 varieties. ! 



Larva — The larva was first described by Mr. Gregson as that of 

 plagiodactylus (" Entomologist," III., p. 186). He writes: — " The larva f 

 feeds on Scahiosa cohimharia in April and in May, eating down into | 

 the heart of the plant before its flowering-stem is thrown up, and thus | 

 utterly destroying it ; it is of a light green colour, hairy, and j 

 gradually attenuated from the head to the anal extremity " 1 

 (" Entomologist," Vol. III., p, 186). This he afterwards referred to i 

 (" Entom.," R'., p. 363) as the description of the larva of a "plume" ^ 



