294 W. D. FUNKHOUSER 



make the Fulgoridae the cuhnination of the phylogenetic table. Stal, 

 whose taxonomic work was of the highest order, considers each of the 

 modern families as subfamilies, while McGillivray and Baker rank each 

 as a superfamily with the present subfamilies raised to family position. 

 Valuable contributions have been made to the subject by Renter, Sahlberg, 

 Goding, Froggatt, Ashmead, Buckton, and Distant, but no two authorities 

 agree on the correct taxonomic arrangement. 



Without entering into an elaborate discussion of the subject, it seems 

 reasonable at the present stage of knowledge to accept Amyot and 

 Serville's group Anciienorhynchi as including that division of the 

 Homoptera to which the Alembracidae belong; and to agree with 

 Osborn that the Cicadidae are the lowest of the families in this division 

 and with Kirkaldy that the Fulgoridae are the most highly specialized. 

 Hansen's very logical conclusion that the phylogenist should take into 

 consideration the importance of the form of the antennae and the structure 

 of their sensory organs, gives the Membracidae a low place in such a table 

 and makes improbable Ashmead's assignment of the family to a position 

 next to the Fulgoridae. 



The phylogenetic comparisons made in the course of this study would 

 tend to indicate that the Membracidae and the Cicadidae, while closely 

 related, have arisen from different systems; that the Jassidae and the 

 Cercopidae have been derived from the same stem as the Membracidae 

 but are above the membracids in degree of specialization; that the Ful- 

 goridae have arisen from an entirely different stem from any of the afore- 

 mentioned groups and are far more highly specialized; and that the Psyl- 

 lidae, usually considered as belonging to the separate group Sterno- 

 RHYNCHi, are much closer to the Membracidae than has generally been 

 supposed. 



The famihes under consideration, then, would be arranged as follows 

 in the order of their phjdogenetic rank, beginning with the lowest: 



1. Cicadidae 



2. Membracidae 



3. Jassidae 



4. Cercopidae 



5. Fulgoridae 



