Article beginning on page 229.
Psyche 7:229-230, 1894.

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April I@;.] .Ps2‰Û÷-c 229
perfected series of Elis does not
appear to bring the species as a
whole nearer to Meadii, but has
rather a contraiy effect. While it
renders increasingly plain the fact
that the neutral ground between
Meadii and Ells is but narrow,
measured for instance by the relative
unlikeness of any two closely approxi-
mate males in the two species, yet it
makes more appreciable than before
thc systematic alienation, and the con-
sequent diversity of averages, dis-
tinguishing the two closely allied
kinds. Species so closely related as
these cannot be satisfactorily estimated from scrutiny of a few isolated
examples. In critical cases, before
a doubtful specimen can aid in a
final determination of the limits and
position of the species, the dubious
example must itself be identified by
comparison with the species. If two
males of Bits, one highly typical
and one extremely divergent in the
conservative direction, are brought
into contrast with the adjacent species
Meadii, the very obvious hiatus
between the two Elis (resulting from
absence of perhaps a dozen usual
intergrades) may impress an observer
as a far more momentous separation
than the narrow interval parting' the
OK-type individual of Eli's from the
species Me&, But when the miss-
ing intergrades are procured, and the
vacuum (which Nature abhors) is
filled, the resemblance of the
untypi-
cal example to Meadii at
once takes
secondary place, and its affinity for
the species Elis becomes the promi-
nent fact.
WESTERN PEDICIAE, BITTACOMORPHAE AND TRICHOCERAE. BY C. R. OSTEN SACKEN, HEIDBLBBKG, GERMANY. The perusal of J. M. Aldrich's paper
in Psyche, February 1895, aroused my
recollections of twenty years ago, and
made me examine old manuscript notes
of mine.
What I found in them may
be of some use in connection with the
three above-named genera.
Pedicia ohtusa. Since I described
this species in 1877, I have received
from Mr. James Behrens of Sail Fran-
cisco a pair of it, taken in Sisldyou
Co., Cal., on Sept. 27 and Oct. 6.
Both specimens agree with the one
described by me in not having the
brown pattern of the wings prolonged
towards the posterior margin. The
female has the usual double stripe in
the middle of the thorax of a saturate
yellow, longitudinally bisected by a
brown line, which is the prolongation
of the narrow median black line of the
pronoturn (or collar), and reaches
backwards the tip of the
scutellum.
The male is a somewhat immature
specimen, paler yellow in coloring;
the thoracic brown line is perceptible




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on the front part of the thorax only.
The male forceps is rather large, as
described by Aldrich.
In Bigot's collection I noticed a
specimen from Washington State (at
that time a Territory), collected by
Morrison. The brown pattern is pro-
longed to the posterior margin, as it1
Aldrich's specimen. I have no doubt
that all these specimens belong to the
same species.
But in the same collection I saw a
Pedicia from Mt. Hood (Morrison)
with a very extraordinary modification
in the coloration of the wings. To the
pattern of P. ohsa is added a broad
brown border, running along the pos-a
terior margin of the wing, from the
root to the apex, where it is bounded
by the posterior branch of the fork of
the third vein ; the breadth of the fork itself remains byaline. The second
posterior cell, in the specimen, was
remarkably small. The abdomen was
broken, and therefore a comparison
with that of P. obtusa, not possible.
Was this a diHcrent species, or also a
mere variety?
Bittacomorpha occidentalis Alclr.
The detailed description of this species is a very interesting addition to our
knowledge, ancl I have no doubt that
the Caliloruian specimens, which 1 saw
in Ven'all's collection, and suspccted as belonging to a species different from
the eastern B. clavipes (0. S., Cat.
N. An]. Dipt. 13. 36), really belong to
B. occidentalis.
Trichocera tricho$twa 0. S.,
Western Dipt., p. 204. This was the
only specimen of the genus Trichocera
which I captured during a seven
months' residence in California. It is
distinguished from the other Tricho-
cerae by the distinct pubescence of its
wing-veins ; in other respects, and espe- cially in the venation, there is no reason, according to my statementi to distin-
guish it from a true Trichocera. During
my visit to Bigot I discovered three
female specimens of a Trichocera with
pubescent wing-veins in his collection,
brought from Washington State by
Morrison, ancl about which I took
clown the following notice : " They
are larger than T. trichoptera 0. S.
and have distinct stripes on the thoracic dorsum. They differ from typical
Trichocerae in having the seventh
longitudinal vein concave, and not
convex; the ovipositor has not the shape characteristic of that genus (with the
convexity turned upwards) ; it consists
of a pair of oval, finely pubescent,
closely approximate valvules." For
the detailed character of Trichocera I
refer to Monogr. N. Am. Dipt. iv, p.
a, and for the convex seventh vein to
tab. ii, f. 13 of the same volume.
Now the three females from Wash-
ington, with their pubescent venation
and Lhcir concave seventh vein, come
very near to European T. hirtipennis
Siebke, for which the new genus
Diazoma Wallengr. (name preoc-
cupied) was established. To those
who will come across the species from
Washington it will belong to determine
whether they are, in all respects,
generically identical with Diazoma.
The literature on the subject they will
find in my Studies on Tip. ii, p. 281




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April 1895.1 PSYCHE. 231
(Berl. Enl. Z. 1887). I would recom-
mend them, at the same time, to have
my type specimen of 7'. t~ichoptera
in the Mus. Comp. Zool. in Cain-
bridge, Mass., carefully examined in
order to ascertain whether my descrip-
tion is correct. I wrote and published
the Western Diptera in a great hurry
FAILURE TO EMERGE OF ACTIAS
LUNA.
In looking over a box of coCUOUb to-day, I came upon five, of A. luna, which felt suspiciously light. I cut them open, and in each I found an undeveloped imago
which had crawled out of the pupa-skin
and had not been able to force its way out of the cocoon.
Each one lay with its head against the
anal end of the empty pupa-skin, and the cocoon was filled with "fluff" made by the scales of the moth nibbed off in its struggle to get free,
Four days ago I received a large cocoon
of A. Zma, sent by mail, and one end of
which was so wet that I expected the moth to emerge at any time. Instead, the wet
spot dried, and two days later I cut open the cocoon, and found the moth with head and thorax out of the pupa-skin, and appar- ently dead. Taking the pupa out of the
cocoon I began to cut away the skin. when the imago moved feebly. By the time I
had removed all the pupa-skin tlic moth
was sufficiently revised to cling to ray finger, and was placed in a cage, where it hung for twelve hours without expanding
the wings at all.
The next moruing, however, the wings
were fully spread, and the moth is now the largest $ I have ever seen. The pupa-
skin was perfectly dry, and there has not bee" one drop of meconium discharged.
In thc five cocoons first mentioned there was no tneconinm, and no evidence of the ends hilving been moistened.
between my return from California in
the autumn of 1876 and my final
departure for Europe in the spring of
1877, and I would in this case not
trust my own statement without further
verification.
Heidelberg, Germany,
Fcb. 12, 189;;.
This m y be an experience common to
entomologists, but it is entirely new to me. Caroline G. Soule.
Brookline, Mass.,
June a, 1894.
ENTOMOLOGICAL x o ~ ~ ~ .
Dr. S. W. Williston of Lawrence, Kansas, has in press a work, entirely rewritten, on the classification and. structure of North Ameri- can Diptera. It will contain tables of all the North American genera, including those from Central America and the West Indies, together with descriptions of larvae, habits, anatomy, etc. It will appear next autumn, In its preparation he has had the assistance of Messrs. Aldrich, Townsend, Snow and
Johnson, who have kitidly prepared or revised the tables of the families with which they are best acquainted.
In a recent and excellently illustrated
memoir (Musaeum Dzieduszyckianum, iv-
Lemberg) on the insect fauna of the petro- leum beds of Boroslow, Galicia, Len-inicki describes no less that seventy-six Colcoptera, of which nineteen are regarded as identical with living European insects, while the
others find their neare&t allies in boreal Europe, Asia and America. As only four
species are identical with those found by Flach at Hdsbach, Bavaria, in beds looked upon as Lower Pleistocene by Flach, and
since the Hosbach Coteoptera as a whole
how far less boreal affinities than those of Galiciii, Lemnicki thinks the Hijsbacli fauna must be considered Middle Pleistocene and the Galician Lower Pleistocene.




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