NATURE 



193 



THURSDAY, DECEMBER 27, i: 



THE BUTTERFLIES OF THE EASTERN 

 UNITED STATES AND CANADA. 

 The Butterflies of the Eastern United States and Canada^ 

 luith Special Reference to New England. By Samuel 

 H. Scudder. Part I. (Cambridge, Mass., U.S.A : 

 Published by the Author, 1888.) 



THIS is perhaps the most remarkable work on butter- 

 flies which has ever been published ; and though 

 it has some features which cannot meet with universal 

 approval, it will make a mark in entomological literature 

 which cannot fail to influence future writings. It has, as 

 the author tells us in his prospectus, been twenty years in 

 preparation, of which eight have been entirely given up 

 to it, and embodies thirty-five years of experience in the 

 field, as well as an immense deal of literary research. 

 The result is certainly a work of which, notwithstanding 

 its defects, both the author and his countrymen may well 

 be proud ; and considering that it is published at the sole 

 cost and risk of Mr. Scudder himself, who informs me 

 that a sale of 350 copies is necessary before the cost of 

 production can be repaid, it is to be hoped that scientific 

 societies and entomologists in all parts of the world will 

 support his arduous undertaking by subscribing to it 

 The work is a large quarto, and will be completed in twelve 

 monthly parts, each containing eight plates, coloured and 

 plain, and about 1 44 pages of text. Of the plates, seventeen 

 are to be devoted to butterflies, six to their eggs, eleven to 

 caterpillars, two to the nests of caterpillars, three to chrysa- 

 lides, two to parasites, thirty-three to structural details, 

 nineteen will be maps and groups of maps, illustrating 

 the geographical distribution of butterflies, and three are 

 portraits of early American naturalists, — in all, about 2000 

 figures on ninety-six plates, together with over 1700 pages 

 of letterpress. Considering that both letterpress and 

 plates are of a high character — the chromolithographs by 

 Sinclair and Son, of Philadelphia, being the best I have 

 ever seen, and far superior in detail, fineness, and ac- 

 curacy to many hand-coloured plates — and that the 

 uncoloured plates are often of microscopical details which 

 require the greatest care and accuracy, I do not think that 

 the price, which is 5 dollars a part, or 50 dollars for the 

 entire work if the whole is paid before January i, 1889, 

 is too high ; though it will certainly place the book 

 beyond the means of many who would wish to possess 

 it. When complete, which will probably be in the cpurse 

 of the next year, the work will only be sold bound in 

 three volumes at 75 dollars, so there is a decided 

 advantage to early subscribers. 



From the systematic list at the end of the first volume 

 it appears that the number of species recognized as oc- 

 curring in New England is about 1 24, to which 42 not found 

 within these limits will be added in the appendix ; so 

 that the amount of space devoted to each species is 

 very much larger than [in any other work on butterflies 

 with which I am acquainted. A great deal of the 

 work, however, is taken up with detailed descriptions 

 of the eggs, larvae, chrysalides, and imagos, which seem 

 to me to be of unnecessary length when accompanied by 

 Vol. XXXIX,— No. 1000. 



so many and such good figures. There are also full 

 analytical tables of the families, genera, and species, based 

 on the characters, not only of the imago, but also on those 

 of the tgg, larva, and chrysalis, which is a feature not at- 

 tempted to anything like the same extent in any previous 

 work ; though I am somewhat doubtful whether its prac- 

 tical utility is in proportion to the labour it entails both 

 on author and student. How far these tables will prove 

 useful and correct when applied to species and genera 

 not found in New England, and therefore not examined 

 with the same care by the author, is another question ; 

 for it appears to be one of the gravest weaknesses of this 

 work that it attempts to deal in a systematic way — far 

 more minute than any which has hitherto been thought 

 possible — with the species of a very limited fauna ; ap- 

 parently without sufficient consideration of the very much 

 more numerous, and probably more variable, allied species 

 and genera found in other parts of the world. 



It has long been known that Mr. Scudder's views on 

 nomenclature are peculiar to himself; and looking on 

 nomenclature, as I do, as merely a means to an end, and 

 of very minor importance provided the same names are 

 used for the same objects by all naturalists, I regret 

 deeply that the utility of such a work as this should be 

 marred to some extent, by the fact that the generic 

 names are in many cases used by no other American 

 or European lepidopterist but Mr. Scudder himself. 

 To such an extent does this peculiarity of nomen- 

 clature prevail, that out of seventy-six generic names 

 used for 124 species of butterflies occurring in New 

 England only twenty are in general use ; nine or ten 

 more are in partial use ; and the remainder are mostly the 

 fancies of Hiibner — which have been practically ignored 

 by recent systematists — or the creations of Mr. Scudder 

 himself. 



The specific names, however, are happily in most 

 cases the same as those used by Edwards, Strecker, and 

 other lepidopterists ; and the English names, of which there 

 is a pretty variety, may be used by those who are amused 

 by them and do not wish to be understood by others. 



What is really delightful in this book, and what makes 

 it a monument of industry, care, and patience, is the way 

 in which the life-history, transformations, and habits are 

 worked out ; in many cases at a cost of numerous journeys 

 undertaken for this special purpose to remote and difficult 

 parts of the country. 



To show the style of the book, we may take the 

 article on " (Eneis^' First we have four pages devoted 

 to the genus CEneis, of which two and a half are 

 descriptive of the imago, &gg, larva, and chrysalis ; but 

 no allusion is made to the species on which this generic 

 description is based, and nothing, unfortunately, is said 

 as to the allied (some of them very nearly allied) species 

 found elsewhere. This is a grave defect, as, however 

 confident Mr. Scudder may be that QL. semidea is 

 peculiar to the United States, it has at least several 

 congeners of fully equal interest in the Arctic region, a 

 sketch of whose distribution could not be out of place, 

 or without interest to his readers, and would certainly be 

 of more value in almost all cases than very wordy non- 

 comparative descriptions, which nine readers out of ten 

 will entirely overlook. Then we have an excursus, of which 

 there are many interspersed through the work, of eight 



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