IBY n. J. TiLLYARt). 571 



to the Limacodidce. If Mr. Meyrick " turned up the record of 

 Palceontina oolitica,'' how is it that he ignored Handlirsch's 

 epochal work, which does not fit in with his own opinions 1 



I accept without any doubt whatever Handlirsch's proof that 

 the PalcEontinidcE were Frenate moths, though I take leave to 

 doubt that they were as closely allied to the Limacodidce as he 

 imagined. The evidence of the hindwings, which are small, with 

 only eight or nine veins, is conclusive on the point. Conse- 

 quently, there is no absurdity in supposing that Frenate types 

 might have existed also in the Lias, or in the Upper Trias of 

 Australia. That being so, all this part of Mr. Meyrick's argu- 

 ment rests upon an unsound basis. 



There is, therefore, no a priori reason why a Frenate moth, of 

 a type^a?' removed from those we know at the present day, might 

 not also have been in existence in the Upper Trias at Ipswich, 

 though I am quite willing to admit that it might not be a very 

 probable supposition. 



(Secondly, as regards the "apparently corneous margin" round 

 the costa and termen. In my description, I simply called this 

 " a wide margin without pits," and added that " the external 

 border, or termen^ shows signs of a delicate transverse ribbing " 

 which " extends also somewhat indistinctly round the apex on 

 to the costa." I purposely refrained from suggesting that it was 

 a corneous margin, as it seemed to me to be equally likely that 

 it had been formed by the crushing down of the deep bases of 

 insertion of a series of stiff and closely packed marginal hairs or 

 bristles, such as one sees in many Diptera, for instance. There 

 was no inherent improbability that such a margin might not bo 

 found on a strongly-built and hairy-winged, primitive Lepi- 

 dopteron. 



If, however, the margin be really corneous, then I admit that 

 the character is of great importance, and definitely rules Dun- 

 stania out of the Lepidoptera. In the actual fossil, the appear- 

 ance of this margin is certainly not such as to suggest a positive 

 solution to this question, one way or another; but Mr. Meyrick, 

 of course, had only my drawing to go upon. 



Thirdly, I should like to reply to Mr. Meyrick's parenthetical 



