8 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 94 



he said was to be regarded as official and for our information in case he should 

 die without making a similar statement to other people, that the specimen bearing 

 the name label was in all cases to be regarded as the true type. To this he 

 added that the true type was the only specimen with which he was really con- 

 cerned, and that therefore what we call paratypes were not indicated. 



(Signed) J. C. Crawford. 



Casey's purpose is disclosed, though less definitely, as early as 1886, 

 (Descriptive Notices, i, p. 162) where he says, " It will be observed 

 that the descriptions refer in all cases to the single specimen assumed 

 as the type ", and " I have preferred, therefore, in the existing state 

 of knowledge, to describe one definite type and give such general re- 

 marks as may indicate the variation exhibited by the material at hand." 



The type labeling has been carried out to respect this clearly stated 

 intent on Casey's part. A special U.S.N.M. type label was attached 

 to the labeled or first specimen of each of Casey's species — that is, 

 where no discrepancies between specimen and description were no- 

 ticed — whereas paratype labels were attached to those specimens evi- 

 dently examined by Casey at the time of the original description. A 

 query sign, preceding the name of the species on the paratype label, as 



Paratype USNM , indicates that the specimen, though doubtless a para- 

 38669 



type, had been set apart slightly by Casey as possibly distinct ; while 

 the query mark before the number, but not before the name, shows 

 that the specimen, although clearly placed with the species by Casey, 

 fails to meet the paratype requirements in one way or another. Where 

 the true holotype could not be located with certainty, a neotype label 

 was used. These neotype designations, of course, have no binding 

 value unless published, but they permitted the assignment of a cata- 

 log number, which in turn afforded a ready means of recording. 

 The actual types of some of these " neotype " species will certainly 

 come to light sooner or later either in the Casey collection or in the 

 cabinets of other workers or institutions. In the meantim.e, the neo- 

 type label acts as a sufficient warning that this particular specimen 

 probably is not the original type. 



Certain complications in the curatorial work resulted from the 

 inexact citation of type locality in some of Casey's original descrip- 

 tions. In several places Casey cites a regional locality when the label 

 on the specimen is definite, as, " Southern Shore of Lake Michigan " 

 or " Rocky Mountains ", when the labels themselves read " Milw.Co. 

 Wise." and " Garland Col.", respectively. Again, we may have the 

 exact locality of the second or following specimen of a series, when 

 the type itself (that is, the specimen bearing the name label) carries 





