( 429 ) 



Both profussors were perhaps a little sarcastic. Nevertheless there is a good deal 

 of truth in what they said. The describing and cataloguing of " species " are 

 certainly the basis of systematics, but also the lowest degree in this science. After 

 that comes classification, or in other words, research in relationship. To have a 

 sound basis in this research one has to start from the individuals wliich are blood- 

 related, and work upwards to the species. The individuals composing a species 

 have each some peculiarity. This individual variability, however, is not everywhere 

 indiscriminate. The individuals are in many instances found to fall into different 

 groups characterised by some corporeal distinction. These are the varieties of 

 which a species is composed. If the species are the product of evolution, the 

 commencement of the splitting up of one species into more must be found among 

 the varieties. The study of the varieties is, therefore, a study of the origin oi 

 species, or the relationship of species with one another ; from which follows that 

 the classification of species according to their relationship depends on the study of 

 varieties. However, if the study of varieties is essential for the classifier, varieties 

 have as much a claim to a precise nomenclature as the species. If we speak, for 

 instance, of Paj/ilio f/ioas from Cuba, /-'. t/ioas from the Gnianas, P. t/ioas from 

 Brazil, etc., all we gather is that Papilio thoas occurs in these different districts. 

 On the other hand, if we write of Papilio thoas oviedo from (!uba, P. thoas thoas 

 from the Gnianas, P. thoas thoantiades from Argentina, etc., we perceive at once 

 that the species P. thoas has developed into a number of different varieties, and we 

 are able to discuss these varieties and their bearing on the general questions of 

 evolution without having constantly to repeat the localities where each variety 

 occurs, P. thoas cinyras being a decidedly more convenient term than " the variety 

 of P. thoas from the Upper Amazons, Pern, and Bolivia." 



The varieties fall into three categories : the geograi)liical, the seasonal, and 

 the individual variety ; the last two being the lower grade variety, and the first 

 the higher grade variety. This distinction between a lower and a higher grade 

 of varieties has been habitual with most entomologists for over a century. It 

 was Esper who first made the distinction. He dealt with variability in a far 

 more philosophic spirit than any contemijorary systematist. In his essay De 

 varietatibiis (1781) he says, p. 18 : 



" In pluribus generibus species iterum subdividi jubet copia et proxima earnm 

 affinitas. Essentiales quibusdam insunt characteres, diversitatem in ipsa specie 

 constitnentes, quos in aliis pro accidentibus habere debes. Ulas subspecies, has 

 meras tarietates appellandas censeo, de tpiibus nunc uberius quid constet est 

 dicendum. 



§ ^iv- 



" Subspecies (Untergattungen, Rages *) quae vulgo annumerantur varietatibus, 

 [plane ab his sunt separandae. Originem e.\ speciebus du.xisse, i)erfectissima in iis 

 declarat partium essentialium similitudo. . . ." 



AV^e have accepted Esper's term subspecies for the essential variety — namely, 

 that kind of variety which is an incipient species. For an incipient species no 

 better term could have been coined than subspecies. According to our researches 

 the incipient species is represented by the geographical race. As no other variety 

 forms the basis of the development of a species into several species, the term 

 subspecies is employed by us for nothing else but the geographical variety. Since 



* Esper's " Gattung " means, of course, what is now called a species, " was sicb gattet," 



