123 



BIBLIOGEAPHICAL AND NOMENCLATORIAL NOTES 

 ON THE HEMIPTERA.— No. 8. 



By G. W. Kirkaldy, 



I DO not propose to reply in detail to Mr. Distant' s recent 

 criticisms (Entom. 1907, pp. 15 and 36), as the matter is not of 

 interest to entomologists in general, and the facts and opinions 

 are cited on both sides for hemipterists to choose from. Mr. 

 Distant, however, implies that I employ a nomenclature of my 

 own, and that my style of citation is incorrect. 



In using " Leptocoris " I have simply selected the name which 

 is proper under the rules followed by every living hemipterist 

 but Mr, Distant, viz. priority. This name was proposed in 

 1833* by Hahn for a single species rnfus (^ ahdominalis). 

 Spinola in 1837 erected Serinetha, with type ahdominalis, alleging 

 at the time that Leptocoris was preoccupied by Leptocoryza (sic!). 

 As a matter of fact Leptocorixa was founded by Berthold in 1827 

 (from the French form Leptocorise of 1825), altered by Latreille 

 in 1829 to Leptocorisa. According to recognized rules, Leptocoris 

 is not preoccupied by Leptocorixa or Leptocorisa. With regard 

 to Mr. Distant's appeal to " authority," Dallas's work is nearly 

 sixty years old, while Stal and Lethierry and Severin are notori- 

 ously indifferent to the principle of priority. It is because 

 Bergroth is so " strict an observer of the law " that I feel sure he 

 would now use Leptocoris. 



Mr. Distant further says, " but it is inexact to write ' Seri- 

 netha, Dist.' ; he gives me too much credit." On looking at the 

 context (Ent. xl. pp. 282-3), it will be seen that my note referred 

 to omissions from the ' Fauna of India,' and the generic name in 

 square brackets obviously was that under which the species would 

 be found in Mr. Distant's index. 



Another small point I may now refer to is that on p. 87 of 

 vol. xl. (1907). Colonel Bingham states that the date 1830 for 

 the text of the ' Coquille ' was not corrected in print to 1838 till 

 1906, after the third volume of Mr. Distant's 'Fauna of India — 

 Hemiptera ' was in print. This is inaccurate, for the correction 

 was published /oiw t/^ars previously, viz. in the 'Entomologist' 

 for 1902 (pp. 316-7), under a special heading. 



II. 



Family Cimicidje. 



Phlaophana, gen. nov. 



Allied to Phlcea, Lep. & Serv., but differing by the juga being 



non-contiguous apically ; the much longer labium ; the much 



* Not 1831, as Mr. Distant persists in citing. 



