THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 31 



■does not seem to be warranted by the Rules of the British Association. 

 Rule 1 2th says: — " A name which has never been clearly denned in some 

 published work, should be changed for the earliest name by which the 

 object shall have been so denned." And in the explanatory remarks it 

 is said, " Definition properly implies a distinct exposition of essential 

 •characters, and in all cases we conceive this to be indispensable" 



Now this Rule merely embodied the feeling and practice of naturalists, 

 and it had been acted on for thirty years, before it had been formally 

 enunciated, in this very case of Hubner, whose work had been systemati- 

 cally set aside as an authority by most European Entomologists, because 

 it was felt that his so-called genera were mere guesses founded on fades 

 alone, — happy guesses, no doubt, sometimes — but as frequently wrong as 

 right, and wholly without such definition as was held, even in his own 

 ■day, to be required to constitute a new genus. Boisduval expressly states 

 this, and his non-recognition of Hubner's genera has been followed in 

 almost all the great systematic works which have since been published. 

 If we take Hubner's first four genera and the characters he gives them, 

 we shall be able to judge of the reasons for this course. They are as 

 follows: — 



Hymenilis, upper wings half banded. 



Ithamia, " " one-banded. 



Oleria . , " " twice-banded 



T/iyridia, both wings banded. 



Such a mode of defining genera, though it has the merit of being sim- 

 ple and symmetrical, is undoubtedly superficial, and it can only be by the 

 purest accident that a group so characterized can correspond in extent to 

 any real genus. * * * In Mr. Kirby's own work, we find Hubner's con- 

 demnation in almost every page, in the utter want of agreement between 

 his groups and modern genera. The modern restricted genus Helicon- 

 ius, for instance, contains species belonging to seven Hubnerian genera ; 

 Pieris comprises five, and Thecla twelve of these hap-hazard groups ; 

 while, in other cases, the species comprising Hubner's groups are divided 

 •among several unrelated modern genera. * * * * The names sought 

 to be reinstated, rank as mere catalogue names for want of proper defini- 

 tion, and should therefore never be quoted. * * * Even as a matter 

 of justice it may be maintained that we should recognize the careful and 

 -elaborate definitions of a Doubleday or Westwood, rather than the childish 

 .guesses of a Hubner. * * * The proper course to be taken is to rein- 



