five new Noctidd moths from Japan. 133 



as Cilix, has nearly the same arrangement of veins in 

 the primaries, the principal dift'erence consisting in the 

 weak character of the disco-cellular veinlets and, in the 

 secondaries, in the different relative position of the sub- 

 costal and median branches, which thus necessitates an 

 alteration in the form of the discoidal cell ; such dis- 

 tinctions, though wide enough to separate some families 

 (as in the case of the CEnochromiichc among the 

 Geovietrina), cannot be admitted to be of sufficient im- 

 portance to enable one to place Arfiyria and Cilix in two 

 tribes so wide apart as the Geometrina and Bomhycina. 

 On the other hand, the genus Teldenia (proved by 

 breeding to be a true Drepanulid), which is even more 

 Geometriform than Argyria, is intermediate in the 

 character of its wing- veins between the latter and Cilix, 

 whilst the genera Macrocilix and Auzata, formerly asso- 

 ciated with Argyria and placed among the Geometrina, 

 are in all their structural characters essentially Dre- 

 panulid(B. 



Whether Somatina should also be placed in the latter 

 family or not cannot be decided without breeding it ; 

 but, if I am right in locating Argyria there, it would 

 indeed be strange that a genus almost identical with it 

 in the imago condition should belong to so widely 

 distinct a tribe as the Geometrina ; nevertheless, it 

 should be borne in mind that structural characters in 

 the imago stages of the Heterocera have not enabled 

 even the best and most painstaking lepidopterist to 

 assign certain • genera to their natural positions, the 

 genus Euphanessa, hitherto referred to Bomhycina, but 

 now^ proved to belong to the Geometrina, being a case in 

 point. 



That the number of branches to the median vein of 

 the secondaries should be regarded as invariably oi the 

 highest importance, will at once be seen to be absurd by 

 anyone who examines the whole of the genera of 

 Zygtenida, in which the median branches vary from two 

 to four, and the total number of veins in the secondaries 

 from five to eight. 



Therefore, although it is as a rule safe to assume, 

 because of a certain combination of characters in the 

 imago, that a moth belongs to such and such a 

 family, the existence of many aberrant forms, of which 

 the life-history is known, and their natural position 



