GENUS CASTNIA AND SOME ALLIED GROUPS. 167 



cient descriptions, especially of Moths, in tliis country during the last twenty years, will 

 embarrass and disgust the student to such an extent as to retard the inquiry into the 

 general distribution of the Order, as weli as the relations of the various families intei^ se, 

 for years to come. Without going to the extreme leugth which Mr. Scudder has done 

 in extending the characters of every genus over four or five closely printed pages (em- 

 bodying every point of the structure of the type in every stage of its existence, thereby 

 converting specific characters into generic ones), I yet hold that the description of a 

 Lepidopterous insect, without a tlaorough examination of its strnctural characters, is not 

 only detrimental to the science, but disgraceful to the author*. 



In like manner tlie entire alteration in the old and well-established systems of classi- 

 fication, both of the Rhopalocerous and Heterocerous Lepidoptera, and the substitution in 

 their stead of other systems which have only the charm of novelty and the love of change 

 to support them, is, as it appears to me, detrimental to the real advance of science. I 

 see, for instance, no reason or even advantage in removing the six-legged Papilionidse 

 from the head of the order, and substituting in their stead the Nymphalidse, with their 

 imperfect fore feet, advocated by the German writers, and servilely adopted by their 

 English followers ; neither can I approve of the displacement of the gigantic Bombycidse 

 {Saturnia, &c.) from the head of the Nocturnal Lepidoptera. 



We thus perceive tliat, with respect to the discrimination of many species, or the limita- 

 tions of genera and families, or the general distribution of the primary groups of the 

 Order, we are scarcely further advanced than we were in the days of Latreille. The 

 genus Castnia of Eabricius afPords an illustration of the various difiiculties to which I 

 have above alluded. By Linnseus and all the writers of the last century the species of 

 this interesting genus with which they were acquainted were regarded as Butterflies, 

 being arranged under the genus Papilio, on accouut of the clubbed structm*e of the 

 antennse. On the dismemberment ef that great group, at the commencement of the 

 present century, by Fabricius and Latreille, the genus Castnia was established ; but it 

 was still retained by the former as the 7th genus of the Butterflies, between the genera 

 Cethosia and Euploea, characterized only by the structure of the palpi and antennge t ; 

 whilst Latreille, in all his works, placed it (with Agarista &c.) at the head of the 

 Crepuscularia, between the Hesperiidse (witli wliich the Uranice were united) and the 

 SphingidEe. 



The connexion of these insects with the Diurnal Lepidoptera rests only on the structure 

 of their antennse, and on their evidently diurnal habits evinced by the brilliancy of their 

 colours. But wheu the antennse are carefully examined they do not bear out this con- 



* It woiild, in this place, indeed be unjust not to refer to the admirable manner in wliich Mr. Staiuton has worked 

 out the eeonomy and structure of the small and difficult groups of the Linnean genus Tinea, in his different works ou 

 the Miorolepidoptera, wherehy he has laid down the groundwork of a classifieation of these heautiful tribes, which 

 had previously been enveloped in doubt and difficulty. His figures also of the veining of the wings of these small 

 and difficult insects, as weU as those given by the late Dr. Herrioh-Schiiffer in his ' S^^stematische Bearbeitung der 

 Hehmetterlinge von Europa,' will greatly assist the student in his investigafcion of the relations of these insects. 



t System. Glossat. (Ed. IlHger, Mag. Ins. vi. 277, 1822). In Mr. Children's abstract of this system, given in Taylor s 

 Phil. Mag. for 1830, the generic name Castnia is misprinled Casiina. 



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