Excerpt from Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society Held at Philadelphia for Promoting Useful Knowledge, 1876, Vol. 15 It thus comes to pass that, neglecting the essential characters of the tribe, to which the species may properly belong, the definition of the genus will approximate in language very closely to that of some other genus, belong ing to a very distinct part of the series. In other words, the genera belonging to several tribes will agree with each other in similar characters of less value than the tribal characters. What I have just said regarding genera is equally true in respect to species. The form, color and sculpture in many instances are repeated in tribes which from their geographical distribution and method of life can not be supposed to have any immediate genetic derivation. Instances of this kind of resemblance will be mentioned both in the Introduction, and in the body of the memoir. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.