New Zealand and AniitraUan forms of Lepidoptera. 73 



(being ;i modified form of A'ellowish blue iii the first place, and 

 a dull grey form of a colour -which only exists when brilliant in 

 the second place); such terms as these occur throughout the 

 the descriptions of species, but when Ave come to genera, it is 

 next to impossible to discover what the characters really are 

 which indicate them; some of the terms have a spectral sound, 

 as in the case of the following: — "the hindwings have eight 

 veins, four and five stalked, sometimes rising out of three, seven 

 a.nd eight stalked," from which it appears that veins three, four, 

 five, seven and eight are all stalked (whatever that may imply), 

 and that four and five rise out of three, seven and eight; the 

 meaning of such a riddle I am not ashamed to admit my 

 inability to solve. 



Where the diagnoses of genera are intelliaible, the distinctive 

 (diai'acters appear to be often slight ; at the same time they may 

 be sufficient, if strictly adhered to; in the case of Enlechia 

 however, the hindwings are described as ■'slightly narrower 

 than forewings, elongate-ovate, hindmargius rounded, cilia half 

 to one," yet under this genus I notice Gelechia .c/jlopterella, of 

 Walker, a species in which the apex of the hindwings is pro- 

 duced and very acute; it is possil)le that Meyrick failed in this, 

 as in some other instances, rightly to determine Walker's species, 

 indeed this seems almost certain from the description Avhich he 

 gives, and which by no means corresponds with the type in the 

 iSluseum. 



Considering that jNleyrick rejects Walker's genera on the 

 ground of their l)eing imperfectly described and, not content 

 with recharacterizing them, gives them fresh names, it would 

 at least be supposed that his disregard for the law of priority 

 would not extend to the appellation, which he proposes to 

 employ, yet this is so far from being the case that such widely 

 known generic names as Eochroa (Satiirniida'J, Euchcctes 

 (Arcti/'da') and Eiipsilia ( Noctuina)^ are duplicated; though 

 in the two latter instances the slight changes of EncJiCvtis and 

 Eiipselia occur: there are doubtless other duplicate names, but 

 at present I have not time to look them up, I only quote the 

 above as being familiar to all workers in Exotic Macro- 

 Lepidoptera. 



