146 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



Let us now examine the table of the Adolescentes, searching for these 

 ultimate peculiarities of structure, not simply differences in the proportions 

 of parts among themselves, which furnish the authority for constructing 

 four genera where entomologists have usually found but one. 



After observing the sameness in size of head and flatness of front, we 

 meet at once differences which seem to consist in merely varied forms of 

 phraseology. For what else can we make of these ? " Front very slightly 

 tumid beneath " ; " below considerably tumid," " very slightly fullest 

 below " ; " a very little bulbous below." " Scarcely surpassing, barely 

 surpassing, barely protruding beyond the front of the eyes." What may 

 be the relative weight of the four discriminating words " scarcely, con- 

 siderably, slightly " and " barely," which state how much the antennae are 

 longer than the abdomen ? Does the ascending scale begin with barely 

 and end with considerably ? If so, how do we grade the slightly and 

 scarcely ? If these words do not express differences, why use them ? 

 If they do, is the difference more than a very small difference in the pro- 

 portion of parts ? What shall we say of these phrases which ring the 

 changes upon the devoted fronts of the Equites ? They are said to be 

 " scarcely higher than broad," " fully as broad as high," " scarcely 

 broader than high," " of about equal height and breadth," " fully as high 

 as broad." In the Hamadryades we find yet other variations : " Scarcely 

 as broad as," " somewhat narrower than," " not nearly as broad as," 

 " about three-fourths as broad as." Whoever will take the trouble to 

 develop one of these analytical tables will find abundant illustrations of 

 this nature ; we believe that Mr. Scudder himself would be surprised at 

 the marvellous facility with which he has escaped saying the same thing 

 twice in the same way. 



The numbers of joints in the antennae scale like a flight of steps. 

 " About 32 " must include as possible at least 31 and $^, unless we reckon 

 like that Massachusetts pauper, who being asked how many were there in 

 the poor house, answered " Between eight and nine of us ! " Then we 

 have this ladder : 



Cyaniris, 33, 34, 35- 



Lycaeides and Everes, 31, 32, ^^. 



Glaucopsyche, 30, 31, 32. 



The whole range has but four usual and six possible terms. 



The palpi are " scarcely more than half as long again as the eye," "less 

 than twice as long as the eye," or " nearly or quite twice as long as the 



