44 
Duponchel’s lacked the red-brown or sienna colouring in the basal 
area ; Hiibner’s was freer from grey freckling on the white area, than 
Schulze’s ; some have irregular black lines more or less traversing the 
white area; some have this area broader than others, and so on. But 
as these various forms are non-geographical, and grade into one an¬ 
other, no useful purpose could possibly be served by naming them. 
The prevailing Scotch form belongs here. My friend, Mr. Arthur 
Horne, tells me that in Aberdeenshire C. truncata is generally a pretty 
constant insect, and the two or three which I took at Muchalls in 
1902, did not show any variation from the normal, unless it be in 
somewhat whiter hindwings ; but I possess one Braemar example of 
the aberration next to be discussed. 
Russata, Schiff., is clearly the oldest name for the form with the 
black central area, usually known as ab. perfuscata, Haw. (Wood, tig. 
580, Sepp, iv., pi. viii., fig. 11, Guen., Atlas, pi. xvii., tig. 2, ab.). 
Sehiffermiiller diagnoses it as the “cinnamon-brown, black-striped 
geometer.” Fabricius ( Mant. bis., ii., p. 207) merely sinks it to cen- 
tumnotata, so probably Denis and Sehiffermiiller may have acquired 
also lighter forms by the time he visited their collection ; for he him¬ 
self had not much acumen in recognising the “ Zusammengehorigkeit” 
of the various forms of the species, as is shown by his erection of this 
same dark form as new in 1794, under the name of strigulata. I 
treat all the dark-banded forms, as distinct from the fully melanic, as 
ab. russata, Schiff. = strigulata, Fh. = perfuscata, Haw. Hiibner’s 
figure 445 ( russata ) may be cited here, though somewhat aberrant in 
the slight tinge of rust-colour which suffuses the dark part. 
Rufescens, Strom, is, equally clearly, the oldest name for the ab. 
comma-notata of Haworth. Strom somewhat loosely describes the 
colour of the central area as “light red, with red, wavy lines,” but as 
there is no really red form known, while his figure shows unmistakably 
that Wallengren’s determination of the species is correct, it is plain 
that he refers to an example of the more reddish-tinged of the tawny- 
banded type. Somewhat similarly, a much more recent author, Fuchs, 
has used the root rufas, in naming this form ; his ab. mediorufaria, 
which seems to have been erected in ignorance of Haworth’s comma- 
notata, and is purely a synonym, is indifferently’ described in different 
parts of his note as having the central area “ rust-colour” or “rust- 
red.” Fuchs (JB. Nass. Ver. Nat., liii., p. 57) cites as another synonym 
bellulata, di Rossi, which I cannot trace. The form is figured under 
Haworth’s name by Wood ( hid. Ent., fig. 557) and Newman (Brit. 
Moths, p. 118, var. 2), and without varietal name by Sepp (Ned. Ins., 
iv., pi. viii., fig. 10), Milliere (lc., iii., pi. iii., fig. 8), and Barrett (Lep. 
Brit., viii., pi. 856, fig. l/i). It varies considerably in the brightness of 
the tawny colouring and the width and intensity of the black or 
fuscous which bounds it. Probably the semi -melanic specimens with 
tawny central area, deserve a separate name as a sub aberration (ab. 
mixta, mihi, n. ab.). Milliere’s comparison of his Iceland form, referred 
to below under citrata ab. unicolorata, with Sepp’s figure 10, is, of 
course, quite misleading, as the two are not even co-specific. Perhaps 
ab. rufescens oftener lacks the black lines on the central area than any 
other form, hence Staudinger’s confusion of it with his var. latefasciata, 
to be considered presently. 
xviii. 
