43 

 The Natural History Museum, London, (formerly known as 



the British Museum of Natural History) houses the specimens 



studied in the Biologia Centrali-Americana (Gorham 1887- 



1899) . 



Tracking one specimen illustrates that it is not 



always a simple matter. The type specimen of Ischyrus 



quadripunctatus (Olivier) , the generotype of Ischyrus, was 



not studied by Boyle (1956) in his family revision of 



America north of Mexico. Olivier (1791) stated that the 



specimen was in the collection of M. Francillon. Horn and 



Kahle (1935-1937) state that the Francillon collection was 



divided and deposited in the Natural History Museum, 



London, and the Hope Entomological Collections, University 



of Oxford, U.K. I visited the Natural History Museum and 



found no specimen which could be the type. The curator of 



the Hope Entomological Collections, G. C. McGavin, wrote 



that the majority of their part of the Francillon 



collection was sent to the (Alexander) MacLeay Museum, 



Sydney, Australia, in 1818. The curator of the MacLeay 



Museum, D. S. Horning, Jr., wrote that they do have 



specimens from the Francillon collection, including some 



from the locality stated in Olivier' s description. But, he 



would be unable to look for the specimen until his recent 



injury had healed. Thus, I still do not know if the 



specimen studied by Olivier exists. 



