March, 1914] COMSTOCK : LyC^NID^ OF CALIFORNIA. 33 



Fig. 6. A flattened, a simple and a spatulate hair from thorax of Morri- 

 sonia {Mamestra) conftisa. The tip only is shown in this and the following 

 figures 7, 9 and 10. 



Fig. 7. The characteristic spatulate scale of XantJwpastis timais. 



Fig. 8. Simple scales, from Prothyiiiia. 



Fig. 9. Flattened hair. 



Fig. 10. Flattened and simple hair from Xaiitliia- 



Fig. II. Coarse and fine simple hair. / 



Fig. 12. Much elongated simple scale from Eutelia. Those of Eriopus 

 are similar. 



Figures S to 12 are all at approximately the same scale. 



LYC^NID^ OF CALIFORNIA DESCRIBED BY 

 BOISDUVAL. 



By William Phillips Comstock^ 



Nev/ark, N. J. 



The account in the Annales de la Societe Entomologique de France 

 for 1852 where Boisduval tells of the collecting trials of his friend 

 Lorquin makes very interesting reading. Lorquin must have been an 

 assiduous and sharp-eyed collector, for it was a fine collection of 

 California butterflies that he sent Boisduval as described in the first 

 paper. Among the Lycjenidje there were twenty-five species, twenty- 

 three of which were new, and a glance through the check lists will show 

 a dozen more butterflies accredited to the same paper. Indeed, Bois- 

 duval's names form the backbone of a taxonomic study of the Cali- 

 fornia material. Of the twenty-three species of Lycsenidae he first de- 

 scribed in 1852, twenty-one stand unquestioned to-day as good species, 

 one may or may not be considered a variety, and one only becomes a 

 synonym. Boisduval's second paper on California Lepidoptera ap- 

 peared in the Annales de la Societe Entomologique de Belgique in 

 1869 and contained a list of the species previously described, addi- 

 tional species recorded as captured, and the descriptions of seventeen 

 new Lycsenidae together with other Lepidoptera. Of these seventeen 

 names, I consider five only as specifically good ; ten are synonyms, and 

 two are varieties of other species. This loss of specific rank for the 

 Boisduval names came about by the activities of our own American 

 collectors during the years between Boisduval's papers. Edwards, 



