Neiv Zealand avd Australian forms of Lepidoptera. 67 



pupaj ; those of the imago being admitted ; but as of secondary 

 vahie; if, on the other hand, we are to found families upon 

 differences in the structure of the wing-veins, the Zyganiidoi alone 

 may be subdivided almost without end. It is true that in some 

 groups, such as the Geometrites, families have beeu created by M. 

 Gui'-nee and others Avhich Ave do not possess evidence enough at 

 present to overthrow ; but some of which must eventually l)e 

 amalgamated ; this fact, however, does not warrant an Ento- 

 mologist of the present day in uselessly adding to the structures 

 which his successors will be compelled to overthrow. In the 

 second place, as regards the typical character of the three 

 "Crambi" described by me — of the first, which I called Hypo- 

 chalcia corrtipta, Mr. Meyrick says — " Very distinct through 

 the combination of the dark fuscous blotches and white median 

 streak," Ijut he does not mention that the secondaries are also 

 unusually large as compared with the prlmai-ies, that the dts- 

 coidal cell of the secondaries is unusuall}^ long and the median 

 branches, consequently, are extremely short (none of which 

 characters are typical) ; of my Aphcmia strigofia, however, he 

 says that the forewings are "broader than usual" showing that 

 the second species is not typical, whilst the third species, C/tilo 

 leucanialis, was aL-o referred to Chilo by no less an authority 

 than Professor Zeller, and is admitted by Meyrick to be •' Very 

 distinct by its large size, narrow forewings, produced apex, and 

 the white suffusion of the forewings leaving only a narrow 

 longitudinal submedian band of the ochreous ground colour," 

 thus the third of the three "typical" species is proved by 

 Meyrick himself to be anything but typical. Moreovei-, Mr. 

 IMeyrick would have it appear, in his introduction, that I alone 

 have thus sinned against Entomological science, yet on page 33 

 I find that " Cramhiis suhnJoseUus, Walk., G. trivmjatus, Feld., 

 and G. rotitelhif, Feld., do not belong to this family at all,'' 

 perhaps it is to that our critic refers when he says " Felder has 

 figured a small number of species, but as his figures are Cf)mmonly 

 j)oor and hard to identify, and his classification wholly conjec- 

 tural, it would have been better if he had left them alone." 

 This is another evidence to me of the disfavour with which 

 those Entomologists who never figure their own species look 

 xipon the illustrations published l)y their contemporaries, 



K 2 



