279 



valiie of the settil patteni, but O. Hoffmann camo to the con- 

 clusioii that in a perfectly natural family like the above, 

 tlie primitive pattern showed great diverg-onccs. In discussing the 

 family I shall return to this. A general importance is granted to 

 this study by A. Spuler (1910), who writes on p. VII of the 

 fourth volume of his well-known book on butterflies and cater- 

 pillars, that the setal pattern is evidently not of such great 

 value as Dyar believes. 



J. Th. Oudemans on p. 384 of his excellent work on the Dutch 

 Insects (1897 — 1900) remarks, in general terms, on the hairs as 

 they usually occur on most caterpillars. 



He does not touch on their systematic value. 



Ambrose Quail's notes on Cossdiae 1904b, [hc uses these animals 



i. a. to determine the number of the abdominal segments (10),] 



are foliowed by some general remarks. He divides the caterpillars 



into three groups. 1. c. p. 269. 



I. single seta-tubercles in all stages. Hepialidae, Cossidae^ Noc- 



tuae^ Geometrae. 

 II. single seta-tubercles only in first stage : Pieridae^ Sphingidae^ 



NijmphaUdae, Arctiidae. 

 III. More rarely in first larval stage some tubercles with more 

 than one seta. Liparidae etc. 



After his attention had been drawn to it by Mr. A. Bacot 

 (footnote p. 95) he says in his second treatise 1. c. p. 270 : 



„I submit the homologue of II B of the thorax is a minute 

 anterior supraspiracular tubercle of the abdomen called by me 

 III 5, that Dyar's III of the thorax = a sub-spiracular tubercle 

 of the abdomen and so on." I shall refer to this in chapter IV. 



FoRBES in 1910 and 1911 also gave attention to the problems 

 I have just discussed. I regret not having been able to obtain 

 these papers. In the chapter on nomenclature I have discussed 

 what Information I got about them from the quotations of other 

 writers. 



It is peculiar that though Dyar as early as 1894 homologized 

 setae and tubercula with the pigmental spots, it was not before 



