THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 189 



BOOK NOTICE. 

 Monograph of the Bombycine Moths of America North of Mexico, 

 including their transformations and origin of the larval markings and 

 armature. Part I., family i, Notodontidse. By Alpheus S. Packard. 

 National Academy of Sciences, Vol. VII., 1895 (received May nth, 

 1896); 292 pages, 49 plates, and 10 maps. 

 Dr. Packard's long-promised monograph has at length appeared. 

 The copious text is divided into ten sections : I., Introduction ; II., 

 Hints on the mode of evolution of the bristles, spines and tubercles of 

 Notodontian and other caterpillars ; III., On certain points in the 

 external anatomy of Bombycine larvae ; IV., On the incongruence 

 between the larval and adult characters of Notodontians ; V., Inheritance 

 of characters acquired during the lifetime of Lepidopterous larva? ; VI., 

 Geographical distribution of the American Notodontidse ; VII., Phy- 

 logeny pf the Lepidoptera ; VIII., Attempt at a new classification of the 

 Lepidoptera; IX., A rational nomenclature of the veins of the wings of 

 insects, especially of the Lepidoptera ; X., Systematic revision of the 

 Notodontidaj, with special reference to their transformations. 



Most of these have previously appeared as separate articles, as the 

 reader will recall. The life-histories are given as fully as our present 

 knowledge will allow, much of this knowledge being due to Dr. Packard's 

 own labours. The plates illustrating them are beautifully coloured, the 

 early stages highly magnified. These plates must be seen to be 

 appreciated. 



A few remarks in criticism of the memoir will not be understood to 

 imply a lack of appreciation of its many valuable features. In general 

 the synoptic tables of subfamilies, genera, and species are poor and 

 uncritical. They are no improvement over those of the author's mono- 

 graph of Geometridse, to which the same criticism applies. In all the 

 figures of larva? the seta^ are imperfectly shown, and their number and 

 position are not to be relied upon. I corrected for Dr. Packard a num- 

 ber of the plates in this respect, but the corrections were necessarily made 

 from memory and on general principles, and there is not a figure which 

 has the authority of a careful copy from nature. Even the special 

 figures in the text are often very erroneous ; e. g., figure 9, on page 63, 

 where the back and side views of the same larva are shown as different. 

 Dr. Packard also fails generally to describe the arrangement of the setae 

 in the text. 



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