THE ENTOMOLOGIST 



Vol. XXXV.] APEIL, 1902. [No. 467. 



THE CLASSIFICATION OF GKACILAEIA AND ALLIED 



GENEKA.* 



By T. a. Chapman, M.D., F.E.S. 



I DESIRE in these notes to point out that certain genera which 

 I call collectively the Gracilariadfe are connected together by 

 certain very definite characters of their larvae and pupse, and by 

 the special nature of these characters are equally cut off and 

 separated from certain other genera with which all our sys- 

 tematists, up to Staudinger, or rather Eebel, following his pre- 

 decessors, have more or less mixed them. 



These genera are Gracilaria, Ornix, and Coriscium as one 

 subgroup, Lithocolletis as another, and Phyllocnistis as a third, 

 together with several non-European genera, this group being 

 much more abundantly represented in America than Europe. 



As a subsidiary point, I associate Lyonetia, Cemiostoma, and 

 Bedellia as a very natural group, crisply marked off by pupal 

 characters from all other forms, with Phyllobrostis as probably 

 representing a connecting form. 



This being so, it is of course merely a corollary that Tischeria 

 and Buccalatrix must find their proper place somewhere else, 

 and not in association with these two groups or families. 



I hardly know whether classification founded in earlier stages 

 has still to fight for recognition ; I hope not — I may merely say 

 that where good characters are to be found in the earlier stages, 

 and none in the imagines for classification, then classification by 

 such characters is imperative. Classification by any one character 

 or by any one stage is liable to be very erroneous, and any true 



* Eead before the City of London Entomological Society, March 18th, 

 1902. Mr. J. Hartley Durrant has very kindly looked through these notes. 

 I mention this in order to make grateful acknowledgment, and to indicate 

 that no gross errors of bibliography or nomenclature occur in them, but of 

 course without for a moment desiring to make him responsible for any of 

 my heresies. — T. A. C. 



ENTOM. — APRIL, 1902. H 



