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XXI.  A  few  Remarks  tending  to  illustrate  the  Natural  History  of  two  Annulose  Genera, 
viz.  Urania  of  Fabricius,  and  Mygale  of  Walckenaer.  By  W.  S.  MacLeay,  Esq., 
F.Z.S.,  S^c. 
Communicated  January  28,  1834. 
As  the  following  remarks  may  possibly  be  of  use  in  our  attempts  to  solve  a  problem 
which  has  long  interested  entomologists,  I  mean  the  true  situation  in  nature  of  the 
genus  Urania,  they  are  now  placed  with  all  due  respect  at  the  disposal  of  the  Zoolo- 
gical Society. 
Fabricius  instituted  a  genus  of  Lepidoptera  under  the  name  of  Urania^,  a  term  by  no 
means  inappropriate,  as  it  designates  perhaps  the  highest  fliers  and  most  richly  orna- 
mented insects  of  that  very  brilliant  order.  Before  Fabricius  these  animals  had  been 
placed  in  the  great  Linnsean  group  called  Papilio,  although  they  differ,  in  fact,  from  all 
Butterflies  in  the  form  of  their  antennce,  which,  at  least  in  the  American  species  of  the 
genus,  instead  of  being  in  any  degree  clavate,  are  at  the  base  filiform,  and  then  become 
gradually  setiform  or  attenuated  towards  their  extremity.  Latreille  referred  these  in- 
sects to  the  same  section  of  the  Linnsean  group  Papilio  as  Hesperia,  and  here  they  still 
remain.  My  object  at  present  not  being  to  enter  on  the  investigation  of  their  affinities, 
I  shall  with  little  farther  preface  give  the  natural  history  of  one  species,  which  appears 
to  me  to  be  possibly  new.  But  it  must  be  recollected  that  I  have  here,  in  Cuba,  no 
general  cabinet  for  reference,  and  consequently  want  the  most  indispensable  of  all 
guides  towards  the  accurate  determination  of  new  species. 
As  far  as  I  have  been  able  to  ascertain,  the  only  known  TJranifB  with  which  my  in- 
sect can  be  confounded  are  the  Ur.  Sloanus  of  Godart,  a  Jamaica  species,  so  called  from 
having  been  first  described  by  Sir  Hans  Sloane,  and  the  Ur.  Boisduvalii  of  M.  Guerin. 
A  figure  of  this  last  is  published  in  the  '  Iconographie  du  Regne  Animal  de  M.  Cuvier;' 
but  as  the  larva  and  imago  of  Uranits  vary  in  their  size  and  colours,  the  Ur.  Boisduvalii 
may  very  probably  be  found  eventually  to  be  merely  a  small  variety  of  the  well  known 
Ur.  Sloanus ;  nay,  farther,  my  insect,  of  which  I  am  about  to  give  the  history,  may 
even  turn  out  to  be  the  same  species  with  both.  Unfortunately,  as  I  said  before,  I 
have  no  Jamaica  specimens  of  Ur.  Sloanus  at  hand  to  refer  to ;  but  had  there  been 
given  with  the  figure  a  scientific  description  of  the  Ur.  Boisduvalii,  distinguishing  it  from 
Ur.  Sloanus,  or  even  had  its  country  been  mentioned,  we  might  have  been  more  certain 
of  our  facts.    Two  slovenly  practices  at  present  prevail,  which  threaten  to  destroy  all 
'  Urania  is  also  a  name  given  by  Schreber  to  a  genus  of  Monocotyledonous  plants,  previously  called  Rave- 
nala  by  Adanson,  Jussieu,  and  Sonnerat,  and  which  belongs  to  the  same  natural  family  Mith  the  Banana. 
VOL.  I.  2  B 
