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Psyche 6:66, 1891.

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c'P .5e,wGffE. [April 1891.
,show the usual green color and mark-
ings of the females. The earliest ap-
pearance at Moline is August 22.
*71. Mermiria hivittata Serville.
Very rare if it occurs at all in the state. Mr. Thomas thinks he has seen one
specimen taken within this limit. It
has been taken at Omaha, Nebraska, by
Mr. Lawrence Bruner so that its occur-
rence here is very probable.
72. hxalis brevicornis Linn, This
is a southern species but it extends as
as far north as Urbana, Illinois, where I am told by Mr. C. A. Hart it has been
frequently taken at the electric light,
as many as seven or eight having been
taken in one e ening, August sixteenth-
LESTES EURINUS S~y.-This species ap-
pears never to have been taken since Harris's day, who obtained his specimens on the bor- ders of ponds in Milton, Mass., in 1826. The only notices which have been published since the description by Say, in 1839, have been based solely on his text. The accompanying description is from the type (a J ) in the Harris collection of the Boston Society of Natural History.
It is a true Lestes.
Greenibh blue above, yellowish beneath.
Head bronze blue above, yellow beneath;
apex of clypeus, labrum, sides of mandibles, and front of face very pale greenish blue, gli'stening. Thorax bright blue above with violaceous reflections and with dorsal and lateral sutures yellowish brown; sides of thorax blue, the side of mesothorax with a biserrate lemon yellow spot occupying lower posterior third, that of metathorax yel- low with an oblique triangular fuscous stripe ; base of ill! the legs, and under surface of femora (especially of posterior pair) yellow ; upper surface of femora, lower surface of tibiae and tarsi brownish green; upper sur- face of tibiae fuscous; wings subhyaline or very slightly flavexent, pterobtigma black; 1888.
The frequent occurrence of a rare
species at the electric light is more
remarkable since it is of very rare occur- rence for the commonest species of
Acrididae to visit a light.
73. Arcyptera Zineata Scudder. A
very form in the northern part
of the state. I have taken a few speci-
mens on the Iowa side of the Mississippi opposite Watertown. This is pretty
certainly the species from the northern
part of the state, which Thomas says
he saw for too short a time to certainly identify. In his list it is given as
Stetheofhyma (Arcypfera) gracilis?
Scudd. The single specimen in my
collection was captured August 9.
abdominal segments 1-5 above blue, 6-10
blackish green ; beneath very pale fuscous, more dusky posteriorly, their apices black- ish ; superior appendages forcipated, beneath bidentate interiorly; the first tooth at the extremity of the basal fourth sharply pointed, directed posteriorly ; the second, just beyond the middle, depressed, laminate, denticulate, directed toward that of the opposite appen- dage (inferior appendages lost) ; thirteen postcubital cross nervules on right, fifteen on left fore wing.
Length (inc. forceps) 46 mm.; alar ex-
panse; 59 mm.; length of pterostigma, 2.1; mm. SAMUEL H. SCUDDER.
HEMIDIPTERA HAECKELIL-En tonlol~gi~t~
who would derive the Diptera from the Hemi- ptera, if any such exist, will be delighted to find in the last number of the Jenaische zeitschrift fur naturwissenschaft (bd. 25, heft. I & 2, 1890, p. 13-15) a description of what purports to be a "zwischenform" con- necting these two widely separated orders. Dr. N. Leon figures and gives a brief de- scription of an insect taken by Prof. Ernfct Haeckel in Ceylon together with species of Psicht 6 066-67 (ore. 1903) hfp //psyche aitclub org/#6-0066 htd



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April 1891.1
Halobates. The insect, of which Dr. Leon had only a single specimen, is 4 mm. long. Its mouth "is constructed exactly like that of the Hemiptei-a," it has typical hemipteran antennae, a pair of prominent compound
eyes, three stemmata, and the head is not freely attached to the thorax. The wings, of which only the mesothoracic pair is present, appear to be hyaline, with a venation which by no stretch of the imagination can be regarded as dipteran. The legs are hairy and adap- ted to swimming; there are three tarsal
joints, the last of which terminates in a sin- gle claw. When we come to look for dipte- ran characters the only one that can be found is the lack of metathoracic wings ; as if this character were sufficient to elevate a hemip- ter to the rank of a diptei-! Has Dr. Leon ever heard of the two-winged male Coccidae, which no tyro in entomology would think of placing among the Diptera? The stemmata
furnish Dr. Ldon with another reason for re- garding his insect as allied to the Diptera, because, forsooth, the Hydrocorisa have no stemmata! We are informed that at the
very beginning of his examination of this insect, Dr. Ldon saw that he was not dealing with a Halobates but with a form which re- sembles a dipter more than a hemipter. He further states that Dr. Arnold Lang, to whom he communicated his observations was of the same opinion. We cannot believe that so
eminent a phylogenist as Dr. Lang could
have examined the specimen. The insect is not a hemidipter but a genuine hemipter
albeit with only one pair of wings.
It will
hardly be necessary to study its ontogeny for the sake of ascertaining that it does not hatch as a maggot and does not pass through a quiescent pupa stage. W. M. WHEELER.
PROTECTION BY CONSPICUOUS COLORS .-
The following passages in Lord Walsing-
ham's last presidential address to the Ento- mological society of London are sugges-
tive :-
"My attention was lately drawn to a pas- sage in Herbert Spencer's 'Essay on the
Morals of Trade.' He writes :-'As when
tasting different foods or wines the palate is disabled by something strongly flavoured from appreciating the more delicate flavour of another thing afterwards taken, so with the other organs of sense, a temporary disability follows an excessive stimulation. This holds not only with-the eyes in judging of colours, but also with the fingers in judging of tex- tures. ' "
"Here, I think, we have an explanation of the principle on which protection is undoubt- edly afforded to certain insects by the pos- session of bright colouring on such parts of their wings or bodies as can be instantly cov- ered and concealed at will. It is an un- doubted fact, and one which must have been observed by nearly all collectors of insects abroad, and perhaps also in our own country, that it is more easy to follow with the eye the rapid movements of a more conspicuous insect soberly and uniformly coloured than those of an insect capable of changing in an instant the appearance it presents. The eye, having once fixed itself upon an object of a certain form and colour, conveys to the mind a corresponding impression, and if that im- pression is suddenly found to be unreliable the instruction which the mind conveys to the eye becomes also unreliable, and the ra- pidity with which the impression and conse- quent instruction can be changed will not always compete successfully with the rapid transformation effected by the insect in its efforts to escape. , . .
"If this protective effect of the partial and intermittent display of brilliant colouring is so obvious in relation to the human eye, must it not be at least equally so in relation to the eyes of its more natural enemies, such as birds, and have we not here indicated a new and distinct line of investigation as re- gards the use and advantage of brilliant colours in many cases which cannot be ac- counted for by the theory that they are de- veloped for the purpose of warning, or
through their aesthetic relation to court- ship ?"




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