PREFACE. 
On completing the present Volume, I have little to add, by way of Preface, to 
the Advertisement that accompanied the first Part. I have endeavored to make 
the work in some degree worthy the beautiful forms it represents, and to this end 
have been fortunate in the co-operation of an accurate artist and careful colorists. 
To Mr. E. T. Cresson, the late Corresponding Secretary of the American Entomo- 
logical Society, I am under obligation for his constant supervision in all depart- 
ments, and in the printing and publishing especially. From many lepidopterists 
whose names will be found mentioned, I have received kindly aid and generous 
use of specimens. 
It has been a delight to make known the charming loiterers of our mountains 
and forests and fields, the study of whose ways has long been to me a recreation 
and a constant pleasure such as naturalists only can appreciate and perhaps com- 
prehend. Works of this class, if faithfully executed, cannot be remunerative in a 
pecuniary sense, and the preparation of them must be strictly a labor of love. For 
this reason, it has been the more gratifying to have received from my subscribers 
frequent assurances of satisfaction as the several Parts have appeared, and expres- 
sions of approval and encouragement from entomologists and naturalists whose es- 
timation I highly value. This has chiefly determined me to continue publication, 
which I am the more willing to do, as many long known species of our but- 
terflies still remain unfigured and the number of new ones increases with surprising 
rapidity. Nearly one hundred have been brought to notice during the past 
twelve months, a large part of which are the results of one season’s intelligent col- 
lecting in Colorado, by Mr. Mead, and the total number catalogued in the Synopsis 
now exceeds five hundred. It is useless for illustration to attempt to keep pace 
with discovery in these circumstances, and in such a world as this continent af- 
fords, but some effort should be made lest the very wealth of species prove a 
hindrance to the study of this branch of natural history, for nothing is more per- 
plexing and discouraging to the beginner than dry, unillustrated descriptions. I 
hope therefore to commence Volume II in course of the next few months. 
W. H. EDWARDS. 
Coalburgh, on the Kanawha River, West Virginia, June 1, 1872. 
