BUGS. 289 



most of the breast, dots along the sides of the abdomen, its tip, and two spots 

 each side of the middle of the venter, black. It is a large species, measuring 

 about two-thirds of an inch to the tip of the wing-covers, and is pretty gen- 

 erally distributed throughout the warm and sheltered parts of this continent, and 

 wherever the larger varieties of Asclepias flourish, either on the coast or inland. 

 L. turcicus is a smaller species, with bluish-black triangular area surrounding the 

 scutellum, a large spot of the same color on each wing-cover, as also each side of the 

 head and front and base of prothorax. This genus is widely distributed throughout 

 the temperate and torrid climates of the whole world, but is most largely represented 

 in South America, where the forms assume a great many patterns of ornamentation. 



Only one other type of this large family need be specified, although North Amer- 

 ica claims a very considerable proportion of characteristic genera and species. It is 

 the Myodocha serripes, representing the comprehensive division Myodochina, and 

 may be recognized by the long, narrow figure, with a conoidal head attached to a long, 

 slender neck which terminates in the bell-shaped prothorax. Its fore-femora are 

 swollen in the middle and armed on the under side with several teeth of unequal 

 lengths. The color is black, with the margins, sutures, veins, and some spots on the 

 wing-covers, the tip of the scutellum, and the legs pale yellow. There is also a black 

 band near the tip of the fore-femora, sometimes also on the other femora, and some 

 traces of pitch-brown on the tips of the tibia? and joints of the tarsi. It measures 

 usually about one-third of an inch in length. The pale margin of the corium is usu- 

 ally contracted before the tip, and a pale dot follows it on the membrane. It is ren- 

 dered very comical by the swinging of the long antenna? with its thickened apical 

 joint while running over the ground among the stones and rubbish of 

 its favorite haunts. Meadows, and rich soils in thin woods furnish 

 it with needed shelter, and there it may be found throughout the entire 

 year, half concealed by bits of twigs and dead leaves, or stowed away 

 beneath the loose fragments of rock which lie scattered over the ground. 

 The common chinch-bug, Blissus leucopterus, belongs here, in the 

 division Blissina ; and JVj/siics angustatus, sometimes almost equally FIG. 333. 



TT" T t* "XT* l-CUCOptt-TUS m 



abundant in the eastern United States, is a type ot the JNysima. 



We now turn to the great super-family COKEOIDEA. Here we find an assemblage 

 of forms, extremely numerous, and bewildering from the endless variety of structure 

 which prevails, and pointing to affinities in many directions. Wide differences of 

 proportion in all the principal parts are common, and we find long and slender forms 

 in close relationship with the thickest and broadest. The family BERYTID^E contains 

 perhaps the most aberrant species of the group, which, althqugh extremely attenuated 

 in most of their proportions, show a close relationship with various members of the 

 family which we have just noticed. In these the colors are chiefly sober tawny or 

 pale yellow, with markings of black or white. Neides spinosus is the principal rep- 

 resentative of this group in the United States. It is as slender as a crane-fly, of a 

 pale taw r ny color, with four joints to the thread-like, long antenna?, and has the tip of 

 the basal joint clavate, and the short apical joint thick and black. The front of the 

 head tapers off to an almost acute, upturned point, before which the face curves for- 

 wards in a long, thick keel. A distinct carinate pale line runs along the middle of the 

 prothorax, each side of which the surface is rough and coarsely punctate ; while an erect 

 spine projects from the base of the scutellum, and another from each side of the 

 mesopleura, just in front of the posterior coxae. The tips of the femora are clavate, 



VOL. II. 19 



