446 Dr. F. A. Dixey on Temperature-Variation. 
among the Lepidoptera the Vanessas belong to an 
assemblage the phylogeny of which may claim to be at 
any rate partially known.* It is hardly necessary to point 
out how much service may be rendered to researches of 
this kind by the careful working out of the true internal 
affinities of Lepidopterous groups. In proportion as their 
phylogeny is placed on a secure basis, we shall be able to 
pronounce with confidence on the real character, whether 
reversionary or not, of these remarkable variations; and 
shall accordingly be able to estimate at its proper value 
the evidence they bring towards the solution of the great 
problem of Heredity. 
* See the author’s paper already referred to, in Trans. Ent. 
Soc. Lond., 1890, p. 89. 
