PREFACE. 



In submitting this volume to the entomological public, the author 



rusts that the method of treatment will commend itself. The recent 



ork that has been accomplished in the classification of the Lepidoptera 



Chapman, Dyar, Packard and others, has rendered a radical re- 



angement necessary. In commencing with the more generalised, 



proceeding to the more specialised, superfamilies, the author con- 



rs that he has adopted a logical course that will meet with the 



oval of those best qualified to judge in this matter. It has been 



idered better to complete thoroughly a few superfamilies rather 



to attempt to deal with a large number superficially, and it is 



that the separate treatment of the main points in the life-history 



species dealt with, will be of advantage to the various classes of 



logists synonymists, systematists, biologists, and those that 



ae subject under its geographical, or any one of its philosophical 



arge part of a work of this description is necessarily more or less 



.pilation, and the author wishes here to express his obligation to 



3 authors to whose works he is indebted for information, as well as 



ae very great number of entomologists (rather more than 200 in 



.nber) to whom he is indebted for local lists, and to those who have 



-plied him with other items of interest that have added to the 



Jness and completeness of the volume. These have always been 



hedged, he believes, in the body of the work. There are many, 



-, who have done much more than this. To Messrs. J. H. 



W. F. Kirby, L. B. Prout and Lord Walsingham, for their 



dealing with matters of " synonymy," to Messrs. A. Bacot, 



3. Fletcher, Drs. T. A. Chapman and J. H. Wood, for the vast 



.t of information relating to the " life-histories " of the insects 



bed, to Mr. G. C. Bignell for notes on the "parasites" affecting 



, to Mr. F. Lemann for copious translations from German works, 



.. Oberthiir for the gift and loan of many rare Anthrocerids, and 



fr. C. Fenn for the generous use of his voluminous note-books, the 



jhor tenders his sincerest and grateful thanks. 



Although essentially a work on British Lepidoptera, it is trusted 



b it will have an interest for other than purely British lepidopterists. 



3 chapters on each superfamily cover the whole fauna included in the 1 



^erfamily, and should, therefore, be of use generally to students of 



uese superfamilies. The " distribution " of each species, too, outside 



the British Isles, is considered separately from the recorded localities 



within the limits of our own country, and should be useful to students 



of geographical distribution in all parts of the world. 



The author is fully aware that in a book containing so much detail, 

 there must necessarily be many sins of commission and omission. He 

 can onfy hope that these are not serious, and assure his readers that he 

 has taken the greatest care to eliminate them. 



The trouble to which the author has been put, and the hours of 

 comparatively waste time that he has spent, in compiling the lists of 

 localities, synonymic tables, distribution, etc., and in unearthing records 



