"The arrangement of these tribes," says Mr. Westwood, to whose work we have been chiefly indebted for the above abstract;[1] is admitted to be but a provisional sketch, of which the outlines require to be filled up in future numbers of the work. It is consequently to be regretted that only two parts, comprising but a portion of the diurnal Lepidoptera, have hitherto been published. Dr. Horsfield endeavours to complete the lepidopterous circle by means of Hesperia, which in its strictural characters and tortriciform larvæ (which roll up leaves, &c.), exhibits a decided departure from the typical Diurna, and a tendency towards some of the nocturnal Lepidoptera, as the Tortrices. Affinities also, of a more general nature, exist between the Papilionidæ and Phalænidæ. The situation of the genus Pterophorus, which, according to Reaumur and the Weiner Verzeichniss, is to be considered as intermediate between the diurnal and nocturnal Lepidoptera, he does not attempt to determine. With the exception, therefore, of the diurnal species, but little progress is here made in the classification of the order. A plan is indeed indicated for its natural arrangement; but it appears to me that the nocturnal groups will be found, when more satisfactorily investigated, by no means to correspond to these views."
Numerous and various as are the forms and aspects of the caterpillars of the lepidopterous tribes, Mr. Swainson thinks that they may nearly all be referred to five principal types. These he names:—
- ↑ Modern Classification of Insects, vol. ii. p. 328.
