178 THE entomologist's record. 



MetoecuA, and many species of Staphylinidac, and there are a few such 

 as Micror/loiisa nidicola, or Le]>tinns tcstan'Ks which hold similar relations 

 with birds and mammals. The distribution of these, as well as of the 

 still greater number of phytophagous species which are dependent on 

 particular plants, can only be studied in relation to such special hosts 

 and plants, and it is obvious that, to explain the presence of the beetles, 

 we must first explain the presence of the hynienoptera, birds, mammals, 

 and plants on which they depend, and whose travels they have doubt- 

 less accompanied. 



(To be c(i)it'uini'(L) 



Notes on Luffias^with incidental remarks on tlie phenomenon of 



parthenogenesis. 



By T. A. CHAPMAN, M.D., F.Z.S., F.E.S. 

 {t'o)uiu(h'(i from p. 153.) 



The Luffias have many other features to rouse our curiosity with 

 regard to them ; perhaps the most important of 'those I have not yet 

 touched on is their systematic position. This may be described by 

 calling them the keystone uniting the Micro- and Macro-Psychids. 

 We are indebted to Tutt for first fully appreciating this valuable con- 

 clusion as to their position. The Psychides have long sufi'ered at the 

 hands of systematists a violent separation of their higher and lower 

 families. Hiibner, Guenee, Bruand, and others in the past fully 

 grasped the absurdity of this, but the separatists still go on their 

 way unaffected. Nevertheless, it amuses one to note that they have 

 rarely agreed as to where the line between them should be drawn. 

 Heylaerts, for instance, placed the Fumeas and Epichnopteryges 

 with the Macro-Psychids ; Meyrick puts them with the Micro-PvSychids. 

 Of course, it may be admitted that in a fairly continuous line it is a 

 matter of taste where you make a division. Still, there is no .ioubt 

 that Heylaerts' division is much the more agreeable to the position 

 at which the most important evolutionary changes are found. 

 Meyrick's superfamily I'sjichina is a most indefensible one, asso- 

 ciating the higher Macro-Psychids with Cochlidids and Zeuzerids. 

 If there is one thing that one cannot resist concluding from a study 

 of the Psychids, it is that, from their lowest forms, somewhere 

 about or perhaps below Xarycia, the whole of them are one branch 

 of the lepidoptera wholly unconnected with any other. 



The lowest Neo-lepidopteron I am acquainted with is Incitnaria, 

 though I believe Crinojitcrij.v is a lower form. 1 have taken the 

 larva of this, but never reared it. However this may be, we begin 

 the Neo-lepidoptera with larvte at first miners, and then, as they 

 get older, casebearers. The tendency in the Addidae was various, 

 but in one direction, including the Adelas themselves, the tendency 

 was to shorten the early mining life and lengthen that of case- 

 bearing. ^\'e may recognise, when this tendency became accom- 

 plished fact, that some forms stayed behind so far as this method 

 of advance went, such as the Heliozelas and others that have a very 

 Adelid habit, but are probably outside that group. Those that be- 

 came purely and simply casebearers present two l)ranches, which 

 may be parallel, or one a derivation of the other. I think the latter 



