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Warrant the majority of the conclusions. The essays suffer also greatly from 

 verbosity. Nevertheless we may say (with some poet) that mistakes are often more 

 instructive than facts. The name mediocauda introduced by Eimer for a specimen 

 of F. polyxenes without locality has been overlooked by subsequent authors, not 

 being mentioned in the catalogues of Nearctic Lejiidoptera. The specimen without 

 home might better have been left also without a name. 



It has been the object of the present Revision to correct to the best of our 

 ability the mistakes contained in the literature on the American Papilios, and to 

 broaden the morphological basis of the systematics of these insects. We have 

 widened the scope of research as far as the material permitted, and therelbre we 

 have arrived in many cases at a clearer insight into the relationship of the Papilios 

 with one another than if we had followed the customary methods of investigation. 

 We hope to be pardoned for not having solved every knotty jioiut. 



The most interesting general result of our researches is perhaps the demonstra- 

 tion of geographical variability in secondary sexual characters apart from the 

 genitalia. The occurrence of such variability is of great bearing on systematics, 

 since many authors consider secondary se.xual differences to be of generic value. 

 The remarkable difference obtaining in the scent-scales of some species which are 

 otherwise very similar (see P. prolesilms and allies) is also noteworthy. Since we 

 shall have to discuss the general questions as to distribution, relationship and 

 evolution of the Pupilionidae in our proposed essay on the classification of the 

 family, we abstain here from entering on such problems. For the same reason 

 we have restricted the illustrations of details of structure as far as it was possible 

 without serious injury to the lucidity of the descriptions. We have further 

 abstained from describing in detail the various known species and varieties, but 

 have given at least some principal feature of each form in order to enable the 

 reader who is not in possession of the literature quoted to determine his specimens 

 from this Revision. The keys to the groups and species will, we venture to hope, 

 also be found useful. The groujis of species have been defined only from the 

 American species which they contain. These groups are not all of generic value. 

 We hope nobody will find it necessary to propose generic names for them. The 

 e.xtent of some of the groups maybe considerably altered in our proposed generic 

 revision by the inclusion of Old- World forms. Besides, Hiibner and Moore have 

 already supjilied a great number of generic names for Papilios, the diagnoses given 

 with the names being of the most superficial kind, and those of Moore, moreover, 

 often very faulty. It is common knowledge that the delimitation of genera in 

 cosmopolitan families cannot well be based on the limited nnmber of species 

 occurring in a single faunistic district. Classification has always suffered from 

 the habit of systematists of studying the systematics of a district rather than 

 concentrating their labours on certain families, taking into account all the species 

 of the globe. 



The treatment of the matter embodied in this Revision requires a few more 

 remarks. Wc are in favour of simjililicatiou of nomenclature. Every simplificatiou 

 which is consistent with the object of nomenclature should be welcome to the 

 systematists, whose labour suffers from unnecessary uomeuclatorial complications. 

 One such simplification is to write in the te.xt, headings, and in the synonymy all 

 specific and varietal names with small initials, and the names of higher classificatory 

 categories (subgenus, genus, subfamily, etc.) with capitals, no matter whether they 

 were thus written or not by the authors quoted. We consider it utterly indifferent, 



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