REVISION OF AUSTRALIAN LEPIDOPTERA. 

 By E. Meyrick, B.A., F.E.S. 



III. 



The families which form the subject of the present instalment 

 are the Hepialidae, which must be regarded as the ancestral family 

 of the Bomhycina, and the Monocteniadae, the most characteristi- 

 cally Australian family of the Geometrina. 



HEPIALIDAE. 



Ocelli absent. Tongue generally obsolete. No maxillary palpi. 

 Antennae not more than half forewings. Tibiae without spurs. 

 Fore wings with all main veins and costa connected by cross bars 

 near base, 1 furcate towards base (furcation appearing as a parallel 

 vein connected by terminal bar), 9 and 10 stalked, 11 from near 

 base, forked parting-vein well-defined. Hindwings without 

 frenulum ; Ic present ; neuration essentially identical with fore- 

 wings. 



This curious family is sharply defined and easily recognised by 

 the peculiar type of neuration, which is practically identical in the 

 forewings and hindwings. I regard it as clearly established that 

 this character, now exceptional in the Lepidoptera^ is ancestral. 

 In the development of the order a tendency to reduction in size 

 of the hindwings, and simplification of their neuration, was very 

 early manifested ; with the result that in almost all other families 

 the normal number of veins in the hindwings is less by four than 

 in the forewings. The basal cross bars are also an original 

 character, very early lost. I have explained elsewhere (Trans. 

 N.Z. Inst. 1885, 180) that these characters indicate the origin of 



