254 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



(Entom. 123) that Lyccena corydon, L. icarus, L. hellargus, 

 L. hylas, L. escheri, and L. eros are all from a common stock in 

 direct descent ; and that L. icarus, P. iMceas, and T. riibi 

 are all from a common ancestor (Entom. 220). What other 

 descendants he may in time father upon this versatile and 

 highly gifted predecessor we do not as yet know. 



Lyccena icarus, he tells us (Entom. 125), is the most 

 ubiquitous and the dominant form in the group. Is this why 

 he selects it, with corydon and hellargus, to be branded as an 

 impure species ? Are hylas, escheri, eros, ruhi, and phlceas to be 

 regarded as pure, and if so, why ? 



That these species ever had a common ancestor may or may 

 not be the case ; but, as all that we can be absolutely certain of 

 is that there is not the slightest scintilla of evidence of such 

 being the case, or any real necessity for such an idea being set 

 up, this convenient and ingenious theory may be dismissed as 

 "out of the range of practical politics." The real cause of 

 Mr. Sabine's varieties (I call them his, as he, so far as I know, 

 first recorded them) has yet to be found ; but it should, I think, 

 be sought in the present, not in the past, — probably indirectly 

 in geological and directly among local or phytophagical causes. 



As regards the original matter in discussion, Mr. South, if 

 he has done nothing else, has, without any clear definition of it, 

 given to Entomology a new word, "mongrels," which no doubt 

 in future times will enable other theorists to get out of many an 

 awkward fix without too great a loss of plumage. 



Mr. South candidly tells us (Entom. 1) that he has given 

 some hours to the study of such species as L. icarus and 

 L. corydon in their native haunts, " with the object of obtaining 

 a knowledge, as far as was practicable, of the whole range in 

 variation of these species, in particular South of England 

 localities " ; and no doubt he has succeeded in doing so. Many 

 of us have spent years at it, and do not consider that we have 

 yet exhausted the subject, or found ourselves driven to the 

 creation of theories. 



From his recent papers and notes in the ' Entomologist ' it 

 would almost seem that Mr. South, having come across speci- 

 mens of some species of Lycsense which appeared to a certain 

 extent either to partake of or to resemble characters belonging 

 to other species of the same genus, first jumped to the conclusion 



