108 Transactions. 



Art. VII. — On the Nomenclature of the Lepidoptera of New Zealand.; 

 Bv G. B. Longstaff. M.A., M.D., F.E.S. 

 Communicated by George Howes, F.E.S. 

 [Read before the Ot.ago Institute, 6th June, 1911. \ 



During the early part of 191<> it was my good fortune to spend eight weeks 

 in New Zealand, during which I visited many places in both Islands. Natu- 

 rally enough, my attention was somewhat distracted from entomology by 

 the other attractions of the country, but in spite of these, and in spite of 

 the shortness of the time at my disposal, I was, largely owing to the kindness 

 of Mr. Augustus Hamilton. Mr. G. W. Howes, and Mr. G. V. Hudson, able 

 to obtain some slight knowledge of its insect fauna. 



Since returning to England many hours have been spent in the British 

 Museum naming my captures. Moreover, I have had the opportunity of 

 examining large consignments of New Zealand Lepidoptera recently received 

 from Messrs. Hamilton and Howes. In addition, I have had the invaluable 

 assistance of Sir George F. Hampson, Bart., and Mr. L. B. Prout, in the 

 settlement of knotty points. 



Mr. Howes suggested that I might give some of the fruits of my labours 

 to my brother entomologists in New Zealand. Obviously, it would not be 

 possible to place at their disposal every determination of a specimen, but 

 perhaps I may save them some of the trouble that I had to go through 

 myself in seeking out the comparatively small number of New Zealand 

 moths in the serried ranks of cabinets at South Kensington. 



All concerned in New Zealand entomology owe a great debt of gratitude 

 to Mr. Hudson for his " New Zealand Moths and Butterflies, " which was 

 published in 1898. The writer of a pioneer work of that description always 

 labours under great difficulties — difficulties which must have been in his 

 case greatly increased by his distance from the vast collections and rich 

 libraries of Europe. 



This paper appears to be a criticism of Mr. Hudson's book, and so, indeed, 

 it is ; but it is a friendly criticism. His book has been most useful to me, 

 alike in New Zealand and in England ; and, in spite of imperfections, many 

 of them probably unavoidable, no criticism can destroy the value of the life- 

 histories and notes of habits and like matters, which find no place in such 

 works as Sir George Hampson's great catalogue. All, I think, must join in 

 hoping that some day Mr. Hudson may see his way to a second edition. 



Here I would put in a word of encouragement to those who, like myself, 

 are not systematists, and are, naturally enough, much put out by the changes 

 of nomenclature that are nowadays so frequent. The value of a generic 

 name is comparatively small, since genera correspond to the views of natu- 

 ralists rather than to the facts of nature, and with increasing knowledge 

 the views of naturalists change rapidly. Some divergences of opinion are 

 due to the recognition, or otherwise, of the genera founded by older authors, 

 which may, or may not, comply with our rules of nomenclature. Sometimes 

 it is discovered that the author's type of the genus was a species now recog- 

 nized as very different in structure from the others included with it. Some- 

 times a familiar old name is dropped because the type species is clearly 

 congeneric with some earlier-described species. Many changes which seem 

 from a New Zealand or an English point of view to be meaningless are clearly 



