72 V LEPIDOPTEKA. 



the changes of the last thirty years were summed up, it 

 would even astouish the greatest votaries of priority. Our 

 author uses Dr. Staudinger's trivial names, but he does not 

 follow his classification, nor does he follow him in the divi- 

 sions of his genera: the position of many of the insects in 

 the list before me is to my mind very unintelligible, for ex- 

 ample, the gap between Smerinthus and Saturnia seems to 

 me a very wide one, yet it is ever a pleasure to see the evi- 

 dence of fresh thought in any classification ; but to this one 

 exception must be here made, — it is not a pleasure to see one 

 system of classification dove-tailed as it were upon another. 

 Now the arrangement of the Geometrae here is clearly that 

 of Guenee ; he commenced with Ourapteryx, because in his 

 eyes it was the nearest European geometra to the SaturnicB 

 which it follows ; but, if he had made Brephos his last ante- 

 cedent genus, he never could have begun with Ourapteryx. 

 Dr. Staudinger, making the Geometras follow Brephos, begins 

 Avith Pseudoterpna, which is more natural; the transition 

 from Brephos to Ourapteryx must be forced. But, enough 

 of this : every one has his own crotchets on this subject of 

 classification, so let me turn to some point of agreement 

 between our author and myself; it is a treat to me to see such 

 genera as Triphcena and Noctua retained; Triphcena is a 

 well-known section of Agrotis, distinguished chiefly by its 

 hind-wings, which are ample, and yellow with a black border, 

 giving a marked character to the group. Now, it may be said 

 that Dasycera sulphurella has just such hind- wings, and 

 so has Ophiodes Tirrhce a— this is true; and if these were 

 large unwieldy genera, and there was a well-defined section 

 of Dasycerata or Ophiodai with such under-wings, they 

 ought to be separated. Generic distinctions must be to a 

 certain degree arbitrary, we cannot define them always with 

 mathematical precision, and hence we must to a certain ex- 



