BUGS. 279 



tip of the venter, and is nearly one quarter of an inch in width across the abdomen. 

 The undersides of the fore-femora are armed with short, acute spines, which serve to 

 secure the bodies of the insects that they seize. It, as well as its young, lurks about 

 the branches and twigs of trees, watching for caterpillars and other insects upon 

 which to leap and transfix with the curved, acute rostrum, and, while holding one be- 

 tween the fore-femora and tibias, soon sucks it to death. 



Our slender and smaller forms belong to the genera Pygolampis, Centromelus, and 

 PnirontiS) while the broader ones, which inhabit the southern states, are members of 

 Narvesus, Spilalonius, and Gnathobleda. Thirteen or fourteen genera, embracing 

 about twenty-seven species, have thus far been described from the western hemi- 

 sphere, and about the same number of genera, with fifty species, belong to the east- 

 ern continents and Australia. 



The Saicina are represented in the United States by the little yellow Oncerotrach- 

 elus acuminatus. It is an oblong, pubescent insect, with the abdomen broader than 

 the thorax, the connexiva wide, thin, curved upward, the head globose behind the 

 transverse stricture next the eyes, the prothorax convexly lobate before a deep trans- 

 verse impression, and with an impressed line along the middle, the shoulders tubercu- 

 larly elevated ; a dark, broad stripe runs from the back part of the prothorax, expands 

 behind, and connects with the membrane, which is of the same color. This stripe 

 omits the tip of the scutellum, which is narrow and acuminate. The sides of the 

 sternum, continuously with those of the venter, are pitch brown. The basal joint of 

 the antennae is longest and stoutest, while the three others are thread-like and dusky. 

 It measures about one-fifth of an inch in length, and is pretty generally distributed 

 throughout the United States, from Massachusetts to Florida, and from Minnesota to 

 Texas. When pursued it often sets the basal joint of the antennas back, and the fol- 

 lowing ones are erected, as if in the act of listening. Numerous individuals may 

 sometimes be found among rubbish and weeds in low grounds, or on the edges of 

 stubble fields, during late summer and autumn. The legs are stouter, shorter, and 

 more simple than in the foregoing forms, the fore femora are hairy and not spinous, 

 but the fore tibiae are furnished at tip with the cushion which is common to most of 

 the typical Reduvids. At least ten other families and sub-families belong to this 

 group, but our space will only permit notices of two or three of these. The great 

 sub-family Acanthaspidina comprehends forms greatly in conti'ast with those already 

 recorded. Here the body is deeper and wider than in the foregoing, although in a 

 few genera, such as Conorhinus, Rhodnius, and Meccus it is comparatively shallow, 

 wide, and the sides of the abdomen strongly recurved ; the head is long, narrow, cylin- 

 drical, thickened behind the eyes, the ocelli placed on this stouter part, the antenna? are 

 comparatively short, setaceous beyond the second joint, and the eyes are transverse, 

 prominent, and placed well down against the throat. The prothorax is triangular, 

 longer than wide, the front lobe convex, generally divided along the middle by a 

 depressed line, and bounded behind by a ti-ansverse, incomplete, impressed groove ; 

 and the legs are moderately short, hardly incrassated, but with the hind pair much 

 longer than the others, while the spongy pit at the end of the tibiae is either minute 

 or absent. This and the following sub-families may be included in the great family 

 REDUVIID^E, which differs most prominently from the Stenopodidae in having short 

 coxae, never more than three times as long as their thickness, having the fore legs set 

 farther back, and the thoracic segments more concentrated. 



A formidable member of the sub-family is the Conorhinus sanguisugus. It is a 



