i8 93 .] THE BRITISH NATURALIST. 219 



costas gerentes, in quiete alas post, occultantes, margine interiore 

 deflexo et circumflexo atque digito posteriore eas amplectentes ; digiti 

 graciles, angulo anali carentes; cellula discoidalis indistincta et aperta. 

 Digiti al. post, graciles ; digitus tertius fimbriis marginis interioris 

 mediocribus ; costse 6 ; cellula discoidalis indistincta. Sp. Scand. 

 bvachydactyhis, Treitsche " (" Entomologisk Tidskrift," Vol. II., p. 96). 

 Mr. Meyrick seems to have been unaware of the existence of this 

 genus for he places bvachydactyla and amurensis under a genus newly 

 described by himself and called Crasimetis (" Trans. Ent. Soc. of London," 

 1890, p. 489). This genus of course cannot stand. He adds regarding 

 these two species : — " I know only the two following species (bvachy- 

 dactyla and amurensis), of which one is European, the other East 

 Siberian. It is an interesting genus, as being obviously the ancestral 

 form of Pterophorus " (I.e.). Mr. Meyrick, unfortunately, gives us no 

 reasons for this supposition nor any idea as to how he arrives at such 

 an important conclusion. 



P. bvachydactyla. — This is decidedly, next to Oxyptilus hievacii, the 

 rarest British plume. There has been considerable doubt about its 

 being really a British species, and I must confess that I often used to 

 feel a mild doubt myself whether the four or five recorded specimens 

 were in reality this or forms of some other British species. Since, 

 however, the specimen in the possession of Mr. Weir and the second 

 (supposed to be in the Rev. Mr. Burney's collection) were both sub- 

 mitted to Mr. Stainton, there should be no doubt about their identity 

 with the species in question. 



Synonymy — Brachydactyla, Tr., IX., 2, 238 ; Zell., ' I sis,' 1841, 856, 

 T. 4, 34; ' Linn. Ent.', VI., 389 ; H.-S., 11, V., p. 381 ; Frey, 417 ; 

 Sta., ' Manual,' II., p. 444. JEtodactylus, Dup., XL, 313, 8. 



Var. fioggei, Mann, ' Wien. Ent. Mts.', 1862, 409, T. 3, 16. 



Imago — Treitschke's original description of this species is as 

 follows : — " Alucita bvachydactyla. Alis anticis nigro-brunneis, maculis 

 marginalibus albis " ("Die Schmett." &c, pp. 238-239), to which he 

 further adds : — " My friend Herr Kollar has furnished in the above a 

 systematic list of the lepidoptera of Austria proper, and first made 

 known this species, which is found here sparingly as well as in Saxon)', 

 where it occurs in the so-called Amselgrunde, a deep rocky valley of 

 Saxon Switzerland. Herr Kollar's specimen, which was a male, was 

 rather faded, mine is a female and differs somewhat from the de- 

 scription of the former. In size it is similar to didactyla, perhaps 

 slightly larger. The whole body is black- brown ; the antennae black, 

 with minute white rings ; at the beginning of the abdomen is a light 

 (white) band ; the feet are very distinctly white and black. The fore- 

 wings are short, divided into two lobes, black-brown in colour, with 

 a few, more or less distinctly marked, white spots, of which the two 



