INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 53 



After this great naturalist had separated Sphcx, 

 Chrysis, and Vespa from this genus, he divided it 

 into two families, viz. * jipes proprie dieted. * * 

 Bomhinatrices hirsutissimce. But, as the learned 

 Scopoli well observes, " Sonus et hirsuties, in his 

 speciehus gradatim aucta, incertos reddit ordines 

 inde petitos (a). And, in fact, authors, misled by 

 the mere circumstance of hirsuties, have inserted 

 species into this family that have no pretensions to 

 affinity with it : an error, which Linneus himself 

 has not avoided ; for j^pis violacea, (Tstucms, &c. 

 are not genuine Bomhinatrices ^ as will be proved 

 at large hereafter. 



Considerable attention has been paid to this 

 genus by Scopoli, and he seems to have exerted 

 himself not a little to set it upon a good footing. 

 With what success we shall now consider. In his 

 Entomologia Carniolica he assigns to it the follow- 

 ing characters : 



APIS. Character Essentialis. 



Os rostro deflexo bivalvi. 



Character Arlijicialis. 

 Rostrum porrectum, iniiexum, mellisugum, 

 bivalve 1 — 3 setum. 



He takes his families in this work from the an- 

 tennae, viz. # Antennis reel is. * * ylntennis hasi 

 infractis. Discovering, afterwards, the insufficiency 

 of these characters to include all the species with 



(«) Ent. Car. p. 298. Note f. 



E 3 which 



