A. G. Butler — On a Fossil Butter jly. 447 



saw them both the same day, and took tracings of them, so that I 

 am confident they are really reverses. That of the Jermyn Street 

 Museum is more perfect than the one you saw in some particulars, 

 especially in giving clearly the basal half of the inner border and 

 some of the cross-veins, altogether proving that the insect was not a 

 butterfly, but an Homopteron allied to some of the CicadcB — a con- 

 clusion streng1:liened by the fact that I saw in Mr. Brodie's Collection 

 specimens which I could only refer to the pupae of Cicada-like 

 animals of just about the size this wing would require. I was very 

 sorry to make such a discovery ; but I think, if you re-examine the 

 specimen and compare it with its reverse, that you can scarcely fail 

 to agree with me." 



In answer to the above, I told Mr. Scudder that Mr. Charles- 

 worth's fossil had been examined at a full Meeting of the Entomo- 

 logical Society, at which Prof Westwood presided, and that boch he, 

 Mr. Bates, and other eminent Entomologists present, had agreed that 

 I had rightly determined the position of the genus ; also, that I saw 

 no resemblance whatever between my fossil and an Homopterous 

 insect. I received (two months later) the following reply : — 



" I inclose a rough tracing of the sketch I took of the Jermyn 

 Street ' fossil butterfly ' — the original made by tracing from the 

 stone, and the more delicate and inconspicuous parts filled in after- 

 ward. I do not see how you can possibly reconcile this to the 

 neuration of any family of butterflies, and there are distinct features 

 which make it decidedly anti-lepidopterous." 



" You are the only living person I know of, who has devoted 

 himself directl}'- to the neuration of butterflies, so that I should have 

 more faith in your judgment than," etc., etc. 



The " tracing " inclosed in the above certainly looked exceedingly 

 anti-lepidopterous, and determined me to go and see the Jermyn 

 Street fossil for myself, and this I took the first opportunity of doing. 



I found the impression far inferior to Mr. Charlesworth's counter- 

 part, to which it undoubtedly belongs. It is in every respect less 

 perfect, the base, front margin, apex, and part of the external angle 

 of the wing being broken away. Although I searched carefully, I 

 could find no cross- veins ;■ but Mr. Newton very kindly pointed out 

 certain stained appearances as Mr. Scudder's cross-veins ; they can 

 only be seen in certain lights, although well marked on the type, 

 and clearly indicated in my figure in " Lepidoptera Exotica." In 

 short, I could see hardly any resemblance between the fossil and 

 Mr. Scudder's tracing, and I wrote to him to that effect. 



A short time since, I noticed the following, in the Proceedings of 

 the Boston Society of Natural History, vol. xvi. p. 112 (1874) : — 



" Mr. Scudder exhibited a figure of an English fossil insect which 

 had been described as Lepidopterous, and as one of the Satyridce. 

 The original specimen belongs to Mr. Charlesworth, and the reverse 

 to the Jermyn Street Museum. The neuration seems impossible for 

 a Lepidopterous insect, and resembles that of the Cicadce more 

 nearly than anything else, but differs in the nervures at the base. 

 In Mr. Brodie's Collection Mr. Scudder found pupae of Cicadinop,, 



