170 Beetles of the Cicindela brevicollis group 
Cicindela brevicollis, ete., and am comparing all material I can get for 
it. Quite lately I studied generally feelers of Cicindelide and found 
interesting features. Am now making some drawings of them and 
hope to be able to let you have some of them within some months.” 
Unfortunately, I have received no further communication from him 
on the subject. 
Dr. Horn in his “‘Systematischer Index der Cicindeliden” 1905, 
gives bertoloniw as a sub-species of C. brevicollis, Wied. and his 
arrangement of sub-species clathrata, De}. immediately below it, leads 
me to infer that my fasciculicornis is the form referred to under that 
name. In this I think he errs as Dejean makes no allusion to the 
males of that species possessing the antennal appendages peculiar to 
bertolonvi and its sub-species or variety. The true c/athrata of Dejean 
is, to my mind, the race of C. brevicollis that inhabits most of the 
country south of the Vaal river and the coastal regions of the Cape 
provinces beyond the limits of brevicollis, which intercalates with it, 
however, at several points and gradually merges into it at other points. 
My aim in this paper is to demonstrate the claims of C. bertoloni, 
Horn to specific rank, as the representative head of a separate section 
of the brevicollis group. Among the S. African Cicindele, there are 
two species, very distinct from one another and from C. bertolonii, 
which possess identically similar fascicles of bristles on the 4th joints 
of the antenne. These are C. regalis. Dej. and C. capensis. L. 
Several species of the allied genus Ophryodera have similar male 
appendages. 
It would be difficult to account for the analogy of these widely 
separated species, shewing identically similar appendages, as secondary 
sexual characters, except on the supposition that they are ancestral 
relics and therefore I consider the possession of them of the greatest 
classificatory importance and sufficient alone to separate C’. bertoloni 
Horn as a species distinct from brevicollis and its various races. 
Discussing the importance of descent in classification, Darwin has 
the following: ‘‘ We have no written pedigrees ; we have to make our 
community of descent by resemblance of any kind. Therefore we 
choose those characters which as far as we can judge are the least 
likely to have been modified in relation to the conditions of life, to 
which each species has been recently exposed. 
Rudimentary structures on this view are as good as or even some- 
times better than other parts of the organization.”* 
* “Origin of Species,’ Chap. XIII, p. 170. 
