272 PROCEEDINGS: BOSTON SOCIETY NATURAL HISTORY. 
of the Heliconidae of the Amazon region. In it he first brought 
forward his ingenious theory of Mimicry—a theory which, under 
the able interpretations of Wallace and Fritz Mtiller, and in more 
recent times, under the impetus of the zeal of their numerous disci¬ 
ples, has yielded so much that is of interest to scientific men. 
The Heliconidae are, above all, creatures of the forest, and Bates 
found that the number of species increases as one travels inland 
from the Lower Amazons towards the eastern slopes of the Andes, 
so that the hot Andean valleys near Bogota, or in Ecuador, contain 
perhaps the greatest number. In their range they are restricted to 
the Tropics of the New World. Only two species, Dircenna klugii 
and Helicon ins charitonius, extend so far north as the extreme South¬ 
ern States of the United States, and none of them are found much 
further south than 30° S. Lat. 
Bates and Felder first saw that the Heliconidae were naturally 
divided into two distinct groups. One, the Danaoid Heliconidae, 
consists of about twenty genera, all more or less closely related, and 
evidently an offshoot from the great universal family, the Danaidae, 
members of which are found in both Hemispheres. The other group, 
the true Heliconidae, is composed of two closely related genera, Heli- 
conius and Eueides. They are allied in structure to the Acrae- 
idae and hence their name, Acraeoid Heliconidae. Scliatz and Rober 
(’85-’92, p. 105) say of the Acraeoid Heliconidae: — They are an 
offshoot of the great family Nymplialidae, which have undergone a 
remarkable development in the length of the fore wing, and in this 
respect have been developed in a direction parallel with the Danaoid 
Heliconidae. In their structure, however, they are quite distinct 
from the Danaoid group. 
Scliatz has proposed a new classification for the Heliconidae. Tie 
finds that the genera Lycorea and Ituna, which Bates included among 
the Danaoid Heliconidae, are very closely allied to the Danaidae, he 
therefore says that Lycorea should be placed among the Danaidae, 
while Ituna is clearly midway between the Danaidae and the Dana¬ 
oid Heliconidae. Scliatz proposes the name “ Neotropidae ” for the 
Danaoid Heliconidae. However, I think the name “ Danaoid Heli¬ 
conidae,” being older and more descriptive of their relationship, 
should by all means be retained. In this paper I shall follow Bates’s 
classification, and include among the Danaoid Heliconidae the twenty 
genera: Lycorea, Ituna, Atliesis, Thyridia, Atliyrtis, Olyras, Eutre- 
sis, Aprotopos, Dircenna, Callithomia, Epitliomia, Ceratinia, Sais, 
