Myrmeleon formicaleo, etc. 443 
lication of his earlier works, knew of the existence of an 
Ant-lion in Sweden from the larve only, considering 
those to produce the insect made familiar to him by the 
works of his contemporaries in other parts of Europe. 
But, later, the Swedish species became known to him, 
and he then amended his descriptions accordingly, em- 
phasising his last by the word “ nostratis.” 
There yet remains to be considered the species intended 
by the name formicalynz. Linné, in the tenth edition of 
the ‘Systema,’ simply characterises this by the words, 
“alis immaculatis, hyalinis, antennis clavatis. Habitat in 
Africa.’ In the twelfth edition, the word “ clavatis” is 
altered, by an evident slip of the pen, to “ setaceis.’ No 
mention of the species is made in either edition of the 
‘Fauna.’ Notwithstanding its African habitat, he 
refers to another figure in Roesel (tab. xxi. fig. 2), 
which decidedly represents (from Germany) the Swedish 
‘species described by him as formicarium. 
The Linnean collection, in the possession of the Lin- 
-nean Society of London, adds to the difficulty. The only 
Ant-lion in that collection bearing a label in Linné’s 
hand-writing is the plain-winged Swedish insect (there 
are several specimens of it, all with the characteristic 
Linnean pins, but only one bearing a label), and that 
label is “ formicalyne”! I absolutely refuse, consider- 
ing the African habitat given for formicalynz, and the 
evidence of Swedish entomologists, to acknowledge this 
specimen as typical. Before the collection was placed in 
its present quarters, it was so maltreated by additions, 
destructions, and misplacement of labels, as to render it 
a matter of regret that it now exists at all.* Any evi- 
dence it now furnishes is only trustworthy when con- 
firmed by the descriptions. It is true that the few words 
of diagnosis given for formicalyne will apply to this 
insect so far as they go; but the African habitat of formi- 
calyne, and the fact that the label-bearing insect is the 
known Swedish species well described by Linné as for- 
micarium, render it certain that this label has been 
wrongly placed, after the destruction of the specimen 
that originally bore it, which was probably one of the 
many African species with immaculate hyaline wings, 
now indeterminable. 
* Cf. Staudinger, ‘Catalog der Lepidopteren des Europxischen Fau- 
nengebiets,’ vorwort, pp. xvi-xvii., 1871. 
112 
