148 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



many of my contemporaries whose experience of former times 

 will coincide with mine. Other species and the representatives 

 of other families have, as we all know, been observed to decline 

 locally, but in no other case within my knowledge has such a 

 general family decline been noticed as that which is made mani- 

 fest in the Satyridfe by a comparison of the present state of 

 affairs with that which existed forty years ago. It has been 

 suggested, and with some reason, that the protection in modern 

 times of small birds by Act of Parliament has some connection 

 with the decline of certain British species of Lepidoptera. This 

 may be the case, and, if so, the enemies of the Satyridte must 

 be sought for among those insectivorous birds which hunt 

 among grasses for food, for the larvge of this family are all grass 

 feeders. To this suggested cause may be added the fact that 

 the Satyridae are not migratory, and that losses by increased 

 persecution are not made good by occasional immigration from 

 the Continent, as is the case with the Vanessidae. It is also 

 possible that improvements in agricultural practice have had 

 something to do with the decline of some of the grass-feeding 

 species, but this cause can hardly be assigned in the case of 

 species which frequent woodlands and heaths. I may add, with 

 reference to the latter, that even the commonest of the heath- 

 frequenting species, C. pamphilus, is a rarity now in the districts 

 referred to as compared with its abundance in former times. 



NEW LEPIDOPTEEA-HETEROCERA FROM FORMOSA. 

 By a. E. Wileman, F.E.S. 



(Continued from p. 111.) 



Macrocilix taiicana, sp. n. 



$ . Head white, face brown ; thorax and basal segment of abdo- 

 men white; rest of abdomen partly denuded, but appears to have 

 been brown. Fore wings white with fuscous grey transverse mark- 

 ings ; antemedial line double, wavy, angled near costa ; postmedial 

 band wavy, angled near costa, traversed by two white lines, and 

 crossed by the white veins ; a black mark in band near inner margin, 

 and a curved tawny streak from end of cell almost to outer angle ; 

 submarginal band not extending to costa. Hind wings white, with 

 two blackish dots about the middle of inner margin, and a black- 

 brown cloud at anal angle; the fuscous grey postmedial band, which 

 does not extend above vein four, is travei^sed by two wavy white 

 lines. Fringes of all the wings greyish tipped with darker, preceded 

 by black lunules. Under side whitish, with blackish macular lines 

 on the outer area of all the wings ; the basal half of the fore wings 

 clouded with fuscous. 



Expanse, 42-48 millim. 



Collection number, 1225. 



