THE YOUNG NATURALIST. 7 



band be found to approximate to that of hybrida, whilst on the Lan- 

 cashire coast every specimen of hybrida presents the same uniform 

 characters. There are no intermediate gradations." 



Dr. H. Schaum, Annual, i860 (Observations on Nomenclature), 

 makes this reply : — " If C. maritima be considered a distinct species — 

 an opinion I do not share — C. hybrida cannot be assigned to Linne." 



Professor Huxley (The Cray Fish, p. 291) says : — "A species, in 

 the strictly morphological sense, is simply an assemblage of indivi- 

 duals which agree with one another, and differ from the rest of the living 

 world in the sum of their morphological characters ; that is to say, 

 in the structure and in the developement of both sexes. If the sum 

 of these characters in one group is represented by A, and that in 

 another by A +n the two are morphological species whether n represents 

 an important or an unimportant difference. 



" The great majority of species described in works on systematic 

 geology are merely morphological species. That is to say, one or 

 more specimens of a kind of animal having been obtained, these speci- 

 mens have been found to differ from any previously known by the 

 character or characters, n and these differences constitute the definition 

 of the new species, and is all we really know about its distinctness. 



" In the physiological sense a species means a group of animals, 

 the members of which are capable of completely fertile union with one 

 another, but not with the members of any other group." 



And again when treating of classification he says :— "Each genus is 

 an abstraction formed by summing up the common characters of the 

 species which it includes, just as each species is an abstraction com- 

 posed of the common characters of the individuals which belong to it ; 

 and the one has no more existence in nature than the other." It thus 

 appears that it is convenient to look upon C. hybrida and C. maritima 

 as distinct morphological species, and this is all. 



C. sylvatica, L. — This species heads the list in Mr. Waterhouse's 

 Catalogue and also obtains priority in Canon Fowler's Coleoptera of 

 British Islands ; nevertheless in the catalogue issued by Messrs. Fowler 

 and Matthews, in 1883, it occupied the subordinate position 

 assigned to it by Dr. Sharpe in 1871 and 1883. One would hardly be 

 surprised if, when the next list is published, it again decends from the 

 coveted eminence. I have taken the insect at Esher, but not in num 

 bers, as the ground is full of rabbit-holes and difficult to get ove 

 very quickly. In August, 1889, I observed several specimens on the 



1890.] 



