Sept. 1896.] Skinner: Study of N.American Butterflies. 107 



mint Valley, Cal. I have also seen specimens from Mexico (Sumi- 

 chrast), near Mescico, Me'x. (Palmer), and from Jalapa, Orizaba and 

 Menanitlan, Mex. (L. Bruner). 

 Nemobius carolinus. 



Netjiobius carolinus Scudder ! Proc. Bost. Soc. Nat. Hist. XIX, 36 ( 1877). 



Cyrlo^ip/ms variegatus Bruner ! Publ. Nebr. Acad. Sc. Ill, 32 (1893). 



Neviobius affinis Beutenmuller ! Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist. VI, 249. 

 267, PI. 5, fig. II (1894). 



No macropterous form is known. There is considerable variation, 

 apparently independent of locality, in the fineness of the denticulation 

 of the blades of the ovipositor. 



Specimens before me come from Jackman, Me. (Harvey — A. P. 

 Morse), Norway, Me. (Smith— Mus. Comp. Zool.), Blue Hill, Milton, 

 Mass. Sept. (S. Henshaw), Adams, Mass. (Morse), South Kent and 

 Canaan, Conn., (Morse), New York (Beutenmuller), Ithaca, N. Y. 

 (Morse), Orange, N. J., (Beutenmuller), Maryland (Uhler), Vigo Co., 

 Ind. (Blatchley), District of Columbia and Virginia (Bruner), North 

 Carolina (Morrison, Henshaw), Lake Worth, Fla. (Mrs. Slosson), 

 Lake Okeechobee, Fla. Palmer), New Orleans, La , (Shufeldt— U. S. 

 Nat. Mus.), Texas (Boll), Texas ''Flying to light" (Belfrage), Lin- 

 coln, West Point and South Bend, Nebr. (Bruner). 



IMPRESSIONS RECEIVED FROM A STUDY OF OUR 

 NORTH AMERICAN RHOPALOCERA. 



By Henry Skinner, M. D. 



I wish to speak of specific values— a subject which has always agi- 

 tated the scientific mind, and perhaps always will in the future. My 

 excuse for writing on such a subject is the fact that I believe the proper 

 kind of studies will enable us to approximate an absolute specific value, 

 or at least get much nearer the truth than is now shown by a study of 

 our catalogues and lists of species. I do not care to go into the trite 

 subject as to what is a species, but think it only fair to give my own 

 view, or that which I should follow in the rearrangement of our species. 

 I look upon the species as the unit of classification, and therefore it is 

 all important to have the basis of classification as scientifically accurate 

 as possible. I would divide the definition of species into two heads: 



