Augochlora Coloradensis, n. sp. (subg. Augochlora).

♀.—Green, often tinged with pulple; face finely and confluently punctured above the base of the antennæ, more coarsely, confluently so below, supraclypeal space sometimes not confluently punctured; clypeus with large punctures, black at tip; basal process of labrum subquadrate, broadly rounded, rufopiceous; mandibles black, rufous at tips; antennæ black, flagellum near the tip fulvotestaceous beneath; striation of the disc of the metathorax reaching to the summit, posterior truncation rounded above, lateral portions rounded, truncation not shining, rugosely punctured; tegulæ, often with a black dot in the centre, stigma and nervures testaceous; legs piceous, femora and tibiæ sometimes with a greenish cast, knees testaceous, tips of tarsi generally inclined to rufous; hind tibial spurs of posterior leg finely serrated; abdomen shining, polished, finely punctured; ventral segments black; pubescence of face, sides of thorax, tarsi partly, and abdomen, whitish; scutellum and first dorsal abdominal segments very fine and short, margins of segments fringed with white hairs; hair on tarsi often inclined to be rufous. Lenglh, 6–7 mm.

The following species of Acridiidæ were recently purchased by the writer from the collector, Dr. R. E. Kunze, of Phœnix, Arizona. There are thirty-two specimens, representing eleven species, one of which is apparently undescribed, representing a new genus. Several of the species are, for various reasons, quite interesting and all are herein listed. They are as follows:

1.—Hippiscus leprosus, Sauss.

Xanthippus leprosus, Sauss. Prodr. Oedip., 92 (1884).

Hippiscus leprosus, Scudd. Psyche, VI., 334 (1892).

One female; Pinal Mts., Gila Co.; July 24, 1900.

This species was determined by Mr. J. A. G. Rehn, of Philadelphia.

Mordellistena pustulata, Mels., was reared June 6th, 1899, from stems of Ambrosia trifida, Giant Ragweed, collected October 13th, 1898. From the same species of plant collected November 10th, 1899, this insect was reared April 4th, May 12th and 31st, 1900.

Mr. Coquillett has found larvæ of this species in plant stems, under circumstances that render it highly probable that they were feeding on Lepidopterous larvæ. The stems of the Giant Ragweed are populated by Lepidopterous, Dipterous, Coleopterous and Hymenopterous larvæ. In my case only by Coleopterous and Hymenopterous larvæ.

Calgary (altitude 3,400 ft.) is strictly a prairie city, situate at the junction of the Bow and Elbow rivers, about 40 or 50 miles from the true base of the Rocky Mountains. For several hundred miles to the east, the prairie is, with the exception of a few spots on river bottoms, absolutely void of either timber or scrub. A very few miles to the west the country becomes decidedly hilly, and in places densely covered witli dwarf willows. Still further west the hills increase in height, shrubs become proportionately more abundant, and several species of poplars make their appearance, the north and west sides of the hills being usually densely wooded. By far the greater portion of the material from which this list has been compiled has been taken by myself and Mr. A. Hudson during the past seven seasons amongst these hills (3,600-4,000 ft.) near the head of Pine Creek, about sixteen miles to the south-west of Calgary. This “hill-prairie,” as I will call it, and which may be looked upon as the boundary between the prairie and the foothills, is well watered by numerous creeks, and the valleys and hillsides—where not too steep—are largely grazed and cultivated, but otherwise splendid hunting grounds for the entomologist.

In the Canadian Entomologist for December, 1894 (Vol. XXVI., page 329), I presented the species of Psychoda then known to me from Long Island, N. Y. In the following year, in the November number (Vol. XXVII., page 324, I added some notes and described one more species. Since then nothing has been published on our Eastern species. Prof. Kincaid, however, has been active in studying the Western species.

During a trip to Paraguay to strudy the mosquito pest, Prof. Voges, the Director of the National Board of Health at Buenos Ayres, accidentally discovered a remedy for mosquito bites. He had a supply of all kinds of substances, among which was naphthalene, a chemical of no use whatever against the mosquito itself. A surprising result was produced on rubbing this chemical ou mosquito bites. Even when the part stung was greatly inflamed, it had the effect of neutralizing the insect-poison. By rubbing it on the spot immediately after a person has been bitten, the swelling that usually follows does not arise.

Ripersia, Sign.

Ripersia lasii, Ckll, 1896. (Native.) Originally described from ant-nests in Mass.; was found in an ants' nest (Lasius Americanus, Em.) at Toronto, Canada, in 1897, by Mr. R. J. Crew. It has been found infesting the roots of China asters in Mass.

Bib.—Can. Ent., xxxi. (1899), 110.

Dactylopius, Costa.

Dactylopius longispinus, Targ. (Introduced.) The greenhouse Mealy bug, fouud throughout the civilized world, occurs in Canada in all the Provinces where greenhouse plants are grown; it is recorded from South Quebec.

Bib.—29th Annual Report, Ent. Soc., Ont., 1898, 43.

Hagen, in his “Stray Notes on Myrmeleonidæ,” published in the Canadian Entomolgist for 1887 (Vol. XIX., p. 210), called attention to the fact that there are several species of ant-lion-flies in this country which lack tibial spurs. He placed these species in Maracanda, McLach., a genus based on one species from Turkestan. McLachlan's description of the genus agrees moderately well with our forms, except in a few minor particulars. But on examining the figure of the Turkestan insect it is at once apparent that our forms are not congeneric with it. The figure [Fedtschenko's Reise in Turkestan, Neuroptera, Plate 1, fig. 1] shows that in Maracanda there are five or six crossveins before the origin of the radial sector, and that the first branch of the radial sector arises far beyond the end of anal vein. These characters place the genus in a different section from the species we have included in Maracanda.

From time to time during the last two or three years, Dr. James Fletcher has sent me specimens of a curious Locustarian taken at Banff, Alberta, by Mr. N. B. Sanson, curator of the Government museum in the National Park at that place. The specimens were all wingless and apparently immature females, but quite unlike anything known from that region. A study of their structure showed that they belonged to the Stenopelmatini and were most nearly allied to the genus Cyphoderris. Now, Cyphoderris, though described by Uhler thirty-six years ago, is a rare creature and was on record from only two localities, Oregon and Wind River, Wyo., and only males had hitherto been taken. The probability that these immature and wingless females belonged with the winged males appeared to me, however, so great that in my recent catalogue of North American Orthoptera I recorded the species given in the title above as found in Alberta.

On October 27, 1900, while walking through some woods along a creek near Wooster, Ohio, my attention was drawn to some white masses on Black Alder (Ilex verticillata, Gray). These masses proved to be plant lice covered with a white down. A couple of branches were broken off and taken home. There were found among these masses of lice, and concealed by them, several small, slug-like larvæ about .75 inch in length. The lice, through the kindness of Prof. F. M. Webster, were identified as Schizoneura tessellata, Fitch.

The larvæ in a few days became restless, as if wishing to pupate, and on being given a suitable place, soon fastened themselves up, and within a day or two passed into the pupal stage; then we knew that we had the curions monkey-faced pupæ of the little butterfly, Feniseca tarquinius. In all, six of these pupæ were obtained, but owing to unfavorable conditions only three of them developed to adults. Other larvæ were found about the first of November, but owing to severe cold weather the majority had perished. Some of these last larvæ were not fully grown, and could hardly have belonged to the first brood.

There never yet was anything new or revolutionary advanced or suggested that was not met with a “protest” from some quarter. When machinery was introduced the hand-workers protested; when railroads supplanted stage coaches the coachmen protested; and so on. So we never had a new list in any order of insects, where changes in nomenclature were made, which was not denounced by someone who found himself or herself compelled thereby to take new views or learn new names.

In the summer of 1889, while engaged in an investigation of the habits and life-history of the horn fly of cattle (Haematobia serrata), the writer at various times brought to Washington from different points in Virginia, large quantities of cow-manure collected in the field, and eventually succeeded in working out the complete life-history of the horn fly, as displayed in Insect Life, Vol. II., No.4, October, 1889. In this article the statement is made, in concluding, that the observations were greatly hindered and rendered difficult by the fact that fresh cow-dung is the nidus for a number of species of Diptera, some about the same size and general appearance as the horn fly, and that no less than twenty distinct species of flies had been reared from horse- and cow-dung, mainly the latter, and six species of parasitic insects as well.

In the summer of 1897 I devoted several weeks to a rapid Orthopterological reconnaissance of the Pacific Coast, collecting material at various points from Yuma to Victoria, B. C., and the following paper is based upon the specimens secured at that time. At the request of Mr. Scudder, to whose collection and mine the types belong, I have studied the material, with the results given below.

So far as I am aware, no species of this group has hitherto been recorded from west of the Rocky Monntains, although it is exceedingly improbable that specimens are not to be found in entomological collections from that region. In the following paper, four well-defined species are noted, one of them extending entirely across the continent. Two others are of especial interest, from the great variation presented by them according to locality, and students of the group will do well to collect material in considerable series.

Prof. Charles P. Loundsbury, Government Entomologist, of Cape Town, South Africa, has recently sent to Dr. L. O. Howard, U. S. Entomologist, a lot of bred parasitic Hymenoptera for names, among which were found three new species, which, at the reqnest of Dr. Howard, are characterized below:

Family LVII.—Platygasteridæ.

Genus Allotropa, Förster.

The supposed “types” of Guenée in the British Museum have been examined, with the result that some well-established names of Noctuids have been displaced by an uncertain determination. Guenée's collection, which I saw in cbateaudun during the lifetime of the author, is now with M. Oberthier, and should be looked through. But the only evidence we have which is vital is the original description; where this is inapplicable the name should not be used. Only on this evidence can we assume that any of the British Musenm specimens are the real types of either Walker or Guenée, because the collections have not been kept intact as Walker left them, and because no type labels were attached by the latter to the specimens. In these pages I have, I hope successfully, rehabilitated Mamestra lubens, and, by publishing the following translations, perhaps other undoubted names may be restored to their rights. I maintain, for instance, that whatever may be written on the subject, a name like Apatela subochrea should always be retained for the species, in reference to the contradictory opinions which have appeared in print. What we want is certainty in designating the object, and, when circumstances clearly admit of doubt and authors disagree, the sure title should be preferred in every case. There is now far more confusion as to specific titles of our Noctuids than formerly, when the current determinations were mainly supplied by me.

1. In his Coleopterological Notices, V., p. 594, Mr. Casey described a new genus of Aleocharini under tire name of Myrmobiota (crassicornis, Cas., n. sp.) as allied to Homœusa, Kr. The only specimen was captured at Iowa City (Iowa) by Mr. H. F. Wickham. Some time afterwards I received three specimens of an insect very like our Homœusa, under the name of Myrmobiota crassicornis, Cas., one directly form Mr. Wickham (captured at Iowa City, June 6, 1896), two through the kindness of Rev. P. J. Schmitt (captured by Wickham at Iowa City, bearing Wickham's number, 9561). After having compared this species attentively with our Homœusa acuminata, I could not doubt that it belonged to the same genus as the latter. I publisherd a note on this subject in the Tijdschrift voor Entomologie, XLI., 1898, p. 11, declaring Myrmobiota to be the same genus as Homœusa.

Mr. J. Chester Bradley has begun, in the May number of the “Entomological Student,” a monographic revision of the Evaniidœ of North America, a work badly needed by our students.

On learning from me that I had several new species in this family, he has requested that I should publish them at once, so that they may be incorporated in his monograph, which will be published in the Transactions of the American Entomological Society of Philadelphia.

Since the publication, in Psyche for 1892, of my study of the Orthopteran genus Hippiscus, a few additional species have come to light, and they are herewith described. The first species belongs to the subgenus Hippiscus, the others to the subgenus Xanthippus.

Hippiscus citrinus, sp. nov.—A compact and stout though rather small form. Head rather stout and full, broad above, luteo-testaceous, more or less infuscated above, dark fuscous in a stripe behind the eyes, the carinæ more or less infuscated; summit of head obscurely punctate, the vertical scutellum obscure and, with the foveolæ, much as in H. compactus; frontal costa broad, flat, punctate, depressed at the ocellus, where it is slightly enlarged, but otherwise subequal; antennæ ferruginous in basal, blackish in apical half.

In Canadian Entomologist, 1895, p. 255, Prof. Cockerell gave some notes and briefly described a species of Lecanium, found by Prof. Webster and others, as L. ribis, Fitch. Later, in April, 1899, in “The Industrialist,” p. 234—5, he again describes it and gives measurements of the antennæ and legs, and states that Mr. Pergande has some doubt about the identification. In November, 1900, Prof. Cockerell sent me two lots of Lecanium, collected by Prof. W. D. Hunter at Ames, Iowa. These I determined as L. ribis (based on Prof. cockerell's notes), and sent a statement of my determination to him. Very soon I received a reply, in which he cited Fitch's description of L. ribis, and stated that under the circumstances the species which he called L. ribis apparently must be something else, and suggested for it the name Lecanium Websteri, based on the species from Ohio, described in “The Industrialist,” April, 1899, p. 235. On receipt of this letter, I wrote to Dr. Howard, requesting him, if possible, to let me have some of Fitch's L. ribis. His reply was as follows: “Mr. Pergande says that he is unable to decide which of our Eastern species is identical with L. ribis, Fitch. Fitch's type has been destroyed, and there is nothing left but a fragment of the twig on which the species was found, showing only the original size, which must have been between 5 and 6 mm. in diameter. Since Fitch's short description appears to agree with L. armeniacum, Mr. Pergande thinks it to be that species, or a pale form of L. cerasifex, which is our most common Eastern species.” At the same time, Dr. Howard kindly sent me some of prof. Cockerell's L. ribis. These, together with specimens from Dr. Fletcher, P. J. Parrott, and those found by me in Massachusetts, were critically studied.