A EEVISION OF THE ORIENTAL HESPERIID^. 103 



each species may be relied upon as those of specimens actually in coll. Elwes or 

 examined personally by us. We have not, as a rule, quoted localities given by other 

 authors, because in some cases it is doubtful to what species they refer. 



As regards the respective share which the authors liave had in this paper, we think it 

 best to say that Edwards alone is responsible for the whole of the drawings and dissections 

 of genitalia and for the conclusions derived from them ; he has arranged in the form, 

 of analytical tables such of the differential characters of the several species as he found 

 to be diagnostic in the greatest degree, and he has had the principal share in the 

 descriptions of genera and species. Elwes alone is responsible for all the localities, 

 geographical distribution, and questions of specific distinction arising from their 

 consideration. 



With regard to the geographical area covered by the paper, though it relates 

 specially to Asia, we have thought it best to take in the Hesperiidae of Europe, 

 because their male genitalia had not previously been extensively studied, and in some 

 cases this study has led to striking results, but we have not included those of North 

 America because they belong for the most part to the Neotropical region. We have 

 not attempted to deal with the species occurring in the Malayan islands east of 

 Wallace's line, because, although a good many Indian forms occur in them, the Austro- 

 Malayan element is probably predominant, and our knowledge of the Hesperiidte of 

 the New Guinea Eegion is too small to enable them to be profitably classified at 

 present. 



In the descriptive portion of the paper we have used the Continental system of 

 numbering the veins in preference to that adopted by many English authors, because it 

 seems to us shorter and more convenient. We have adopted a few terms from 

 Mr. Meyrick's recent ' Handbook of British Lepidoptera ' : thus the dorsum is the 

 edge of the wing opposite to the costa, the termen the edge of the wing opposite to 

 the base, and the tornus is the angle in which the dorsum joins the termen. The 

 transverse vein, sometimes called the upper, middle, and lower discocellular nervules, is 

 that which forms the apical boundary of the discal cell. The subcostal and median 

 segments are the pieces of the subcostal and median veins which lie between the bases 

 of veins 7-11 and 2-4 respectively ; they are numbered from the base : thus the 

 second median segment forms the base of cell 2 and so on. The simple vein nearest to 

 the dorsum in both fore and hind wings is called vein la, and the second vein from 

 the dorsum of the hind wing is called vein lb. With the exception of the discal cell 

 in each wing, which is referred to simply as the cell, the name of each cell is taken 

 from that of the vein forming its lower boundary. 



With a few unimportant exceptions, this paper will be found to contain a concise 

 statement of the diagnostic characters of all the species of Hesperiidae hitherto 

 described from the region treated of ; although we have not given or quoted 

 descriptions in full, except in the case of newly-described species and a few obscure 



ones which we have not seen. 



p2 



