THE SURFAMTI-Y PAPILIONINAK. 1227 



Papilio. iMost entomologists would so class all the species contuiucd in 

 the present work. Besides the inertia of prejudice and tradition to be 

 overcome, there is no longer any excuse for such a course. The few com- 

 monly accepted genera of Papilioninac have up to the present time been 

 establifihed not only almost entirely upon characters drawn from the perfect 

 insect, but even upon a very narrow selection of these. The neuration of 

 the wings has been employed nearly to the exclusion of everything else. 

 Even the Felders, who attempted to separate the subfamily into clearly 

 defined groups, hardly employed any other characters. Now it so hap- 

 pens that the neuration is remarkably uniform throughout the group, in 

 striking distinction from the condition among their near allies, the Pieri- 

 nae ; but in the relative length of the tibiae to the femora and tarsi, — 

 characters absolutely neglected — and in other features of the leg structure, 

 we find differences even in the imago which are verv striking and intrin- 

 sically far more important. While if we examine the early stages, ex- 

 cepting the egg (which is exceptionally uniform, as it is in the Pamphilidi) 

 we discover many striking differences ; there is indeed so great a variety 

 among the caterpillars, particularly when mature, that the diffei'ences 

 between the caterpillars of the genera of Pierinae or of those even 

 of the Nymphalidae are insignificant beside them. Quite the same is true 

 of the chrysalis, and we must conclude that the reason for the retention of 

 the generic term Papilio to cover such a vast variety of form and structure 

 is due simply to the fact that systematic natui-alists have hitherto depended 

 almost entirely upon characters drawn from the perfect insects ; when they 

 have mentioned the earlier stages it has only been in broad terms which 

 implied no critical study whatever of their structure. Such a limitation is 

 no longer justified. We invite attention to the tables and the descriptions 

 which follow, and ask anystudent to compare, for instance, the caterpillars 

 and chrysalids on the one hand of Vanessa with those of Argynnis (using 

 these terms with the very widest latitude) and on the other hand of Laertias 

 with those of Iphiclides, and either of these with Heraclides (using these 

 in the narrov\r sense in which they are employed in this work) and if he can 

 find rt.« fjnod gi-ounds for separating the first two from each other as he can 

 the last three, I should be glad to have them stated. If he cannot, and 

 refuses to recognize these facts by theuseof terms having as high a taxo- 

 nomic meaning in the latter case as in the former, then he is yielding to 

 prejudice, or to tradition, or to indolence, and is helping to perpetuate a 

 false view of nature. The transformations of the principal genera, it should 

 be added, are now as well known and as accessible among the Papilioninac 

 as among the Nymphalinae. No excuse is needed for following in the 

 present work the same taxonomic principles in both the groups ; those 

 who slavishly follow the ignorance of their fathers should be the apolo- 



gists. 



