ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF ONTARIO. 63 



by Simon on the spiders ; by Bruner von Wattenwayl on the Orthoptera ; by Uhler on 

 the Hemiptera ; by Forel on the ants ; by Matthews on the Trichopterygidse and Corylop- 

 hidse ; by Peckham on the Attid spiders ; by Kirby on the dragon-flies ; by G-ahan on 

 the Longicorns ; by Champion on the heteromerous Ooleoptera ; by Williston on the 

 Diptera; by Waterhouse on the Buprestidse, and by Ashmead and Howard on the para- 

 sitic Hymenoptera. There are papers in preparation by Blandford on the Seolytidse ; by 

 Butler and Hampson on the Heterocera ; by Champion on the Elateridse ; by Gahan on 

 the Phytophaga and Lamellicornia ; by Kerremans on the Buprestidse. 



I have beeu much interested in examining all of the papers which have been so fa 

 published on the insect collections I have seen them all, except Dr. Williston's " Dipter 

 of St. Vincent," which, although just published, has not yet reached me, and a paper by 

 Warren, on "New Genera and Species of Geometridae," in which, I learn from the 

 Zoological Record of 1894, no less than 170 new genera have been proposed. The 

 remaining papers cover a rather large field, including groups of Coleoptera, Lepidoptera, 

 Hymenoptera, Heteroptera, Hemiptera, and Arachmda, although in no one group have 

 the entire results appeared. 



A brief summary shows that exclusive of the two papers just mentioned, 1472 

 species have received consideration up to the present time. Of these 789 are new to 

 science while 683 have previously been described. These 1472 species are distributed in 

 836 genera, of which 75 are new. What a notable contribution to science we have, even 

 at the present time ! % 



In attempting to summarize the conclusions of the different authors in regard to the 

 character of the fauna considerable difficulty is experienced. In many of the groups 

 descriptive work is not enough advanced to allow accurate generalizations and in others 

 certain of the workers have seemed indifferent to the broad interest attaching to this side 

 of the investigation. In Mr. Champion's work upon the Heteromera it is stated that all 

 of the genera except four are common to Central America, and all except eight have 

 been found in South America. Ten are common to Central America, but he states, in 

 general, that taken as a whole, the material studied by him shows a considerable affinity 

 with the fauna of the northeastern parts of South America. The number of endemic 

 genera are very few and the endemic species closely allied to the South America forms. 

 As a result of Uhler's studies of the St. Vincent species he shows that the collection of 

 Homoptera " is an assemblage of forms, mostly small and neat, which offer a striking 

 contrast to the large and showy insects that inhabit the regions of the South American 

 continent, a few hundreds of miles away. It is not, however, to this nearest part of 

 the continent that we must look for the source of distribution from which this assemblage 

 was derived. The Mexican character of the fauna seems unquestionable." In his con- 

 sideration of the Heteroptera of Grenada he says that "the hemipterous fauna is Central 

 American. It is largely composed of forms which belong to the borders of the tropics, 

 rather than of such distinct tropical ones as inhabit the South American continent." 

 Lord Walsingham, in his consideration of the micro-Lepidoptera, says that the forms are 

 decidedly American, ranging northward to the southern and western portions of the 

 United States and southward as far at least as Brazil ; "the majority, however, certainly 

 belong to the truly Central American fauna." In this sentence however, Lord Walsing- 

 ham speaks of the West Indies as a whole, when, as a matter of fact, of the forty six 

 species which he describes from St. Vincent, thirty-eight were new while two had pre- 

 viously been found in Brazil, four in the United States, one in Venezuela and two were 

 cosmopolitan. Of the species studied by Mr. Simon from St Vincent, about eighty per 

 cent are new, although a considerable number of the novelties were known by him from 

 his own collecting to occur in Venezuela. Of the old species all had previously been 

 found in northern South America, Central America, or southern United States Only 

 two, in fact, range into the United States. Mr. Gahan simply indicates "a pretty close 

 relation between the West Indian fauna and that of tropical America." Dr. Williston 

 writes concerning the Diptera that most of the forms were minute and consequently 

 belong to groups that have been but little studied from South to Central America. The 

 relationships he considers to be decidedly. South American. 



