Xll 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 



they inhabit. These, and others, are some of the many problems 

 which a local Catalogue, if even approximately complete, should aid 

 us in discussing. Perhaps however the greatest enigma of all on 

 which the subject of the present volume, and the results therein 

 arrived at, might tempt us to speculate, is the possibility of the 

 Madeiras, Salvages and Canaries being in reality but the remaining 

 portions of a vast continent which was broken up by some over- 

 whelming catastrophe at a very remote epoch but when nevertheless 

 it was tenanted by the same forms which occur (in some instances 

 slightly altered by isolation) on its now detached parts. But as this 

 well-known theory, if referred to again, will be better placed towards 

 the close of my Introductory chapter, I will not comment upon it 

 here ; but I will proceed to the consideration of some drier details, 

 about which there can be no room for doubt. 



General Statistics. In the examination of the Coleoptera recorded 

 in this work, I may state broadly, at the outset, that I have had but 

 one object in view namely, to arrive at the truth. Had I been 

 anxious to augment the list, by straining, in the slightest degree, 

 the importance of minute differences (which my better judgment led 

 me to conclude were in reality the result of variation), I might have 

 had abundant opportunities for doing so ; but in each separate case 

 I have tried to take into account all the evidence that was before 

 me, and whilst in some instances comparatively obscure distinctions 

 have seemed sufficient for indicating a true species, in others I have 

 allowed the widest limits for aberration. As a general principle, this 

 must be philosophical, to any one who believes in species as they are 

 commonly understood by that term ; for they cannot all be equally 

 plastic, and will therefore vary each in its own way, and in precise 

 accordance with its inherent capacity for external change. Hence, 

 likewise, I have not failed to act honestly towards supposed species 

 (when such happened to present themselves) which I had myself 

 formerly described, but which further and more satisfactory material 

 has since convinced me would be better treated as varieties, or insular 

 states. In all cases where the latest evidence seemed to point towards 

 an amalgamation of forms which I had assumed hitherto to be truly 

 distinct, I have not hesitated to act upon it whether the forms in 

 question were originally named by myself, or by others*. 





* The following, consequently, which until now I had regarded as true species, 

 have been suppressed in this Catalogue : Hydroporus Lyellii, W. ; Myrmeco- 

 xenus sordidus, W. ; Phloeophagus affinis, W. ; Hypera variabilis, Hbst ; Bruchus 



