INTRODUCTION. vil 
to satisfy myself as to this and some other points, I have divided our subregion into 
five subdivisions, and then computed the number of species found in each of these 
subdivisions or provinces, and will now mention the results. The provinces adopted as 
most convenient for the purposes I had in view are as follows:—(1) North or extra- 
tropical Mexico, the line of the Tropic of Cancer being taken as its southern limit; 
(2) Tropical or South Mexico, including Yucatan, from which latter country we have 
received, however, very few Staphylinide; (3) Guatemala, including with it Honduras 
and British Honduras; (4) Nicaragua and Costa Rica; and (5) Panama—the limit 
between (4) and (5) being unknown, and perhaps only a question of collecting. I find 
that we have received from North Mexico 42, from Tropical Mexico 453, from Guate- 
mala 726, from Nicaragua and Costa Rica 157, and from Panama 457 species. I find 
also that 34 of our species are known to occur in North America, and 97 in South 
America and the Antilles. I will briefly comment on each of these figures. 
The 42 species from North Mexico are mostly new and peculiar to the province, but 
the number cannot represent more than one tenth of the species that actually exist 
there ; so that we do not possess the data for forming an opinion as to the amount of 
endemicity of the province. This country is, for several reasons, of peculiar interest ; 
and it is a matter of regret that the difficulties that must necessarily be encountered by 
a naturalist collecting there are so great that it must be long before even an approxi- 
mately correct idea can be formed as to the true details of its insect-fauna. It will 
probably prove poor in Staphylinide when compared with our other provinces. 
From Tropical or Southern Mexico we have as yet received 453 species of Staphy- 
linide. ‘This number is quite inadequate, and is due, no doubt, to the fact that the 
smaller insects of this family have been neglected by the collectors who have investi- 
gated the province. Keeping in view the large extent of South Mexico, and its great 
variety of surface, climate, and vegetation, it is clear to me that we are not yet 
acquainted with more than one fourth of its species of Staphylinide. 
This conclusion is rendered still more certain when we consider the number already 
found in Guatemala. Although in my table of this province I included the species we 
have received from Honduras, yet these are so few that our total of 726 species may be 
treated as being found in political Guatemala, which, notwithstanding its small area, thus 
appears to be far the richest province of our region in Staphylinide ; this, I believe, 
is actually not the case—the present predominance being due to Mr. Champion having 
been long stationed there, and to his having assiduously collected even the smallest and 
