116 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



Dear Sir, — 



In your last issue Dr. LeConte pronounces my record of the capture 

 here of Alans gorgops to be " probably erroneous," because he has not 

 known any instance of that insect having been taken north of Texas and 

 Western Louisiana, and that therefore my specimen nmst be Alans 

 oculatus. 



Alaus oculatus is of such common occurrence here that I have lone 

 ceased to collect specimens, unless remarkable for beauty or for abnormal 

 size, either large or small, and with over twenty years' acquaintance I 

 ought to be tolerably familiar with its appearance and proportions. The 

 specimen in dispute was found resting on a stump in Bleecker's Woods, 

 about half a mile from our city limits, and was taken by me as an unusually 

 fine and large example of Alaus oculatus^ and placed as such among my 

 seasonal captures ; but on placing it in my cabinet I observed so marked 

 and manifest a difference between it and the other specimens, that  I 

 thought it might be a distinct species. Finding from Crotch's List that 

 there were only three species known, and possessing examples of two of 

 them, I obtained a specimen of A. gorgops from Mr. E. P. Austin, of 

 Boston, for the sake of comparison, which came to hand ticketed 

 " Dallas, Texas." On placing this side by side with mine, I was unable to 

 distinguish the slightest shade of difference except that mine is rather the 

 larger and fresher specimen. In order to show the identity of these two 

 examples, and their common difference from A. oculatus^ I append their 

 respective measurements as taken at the time, and carefully repeated and 

 verified, as also the dimensions of my largest specimen of A. oculatus: 



Mr. Austin's sp'n. My own. A. oculatus. 



Total length, 41 mm. (about 1^3 in.) 42 mm. 42/^ mm. 



Length of thorax, 12 mm. (sharp.) 12 mm. (full.) i2i4 " 



Breadth of thorax, n^ mm. 12 mm. 11 " 



Breadth of elytra, 11^ mm. (full.) i2>^ " n^ " 



The ocular spots on the thorax are much larger and more circular in 

 shape than those of A. oculatus^ and the white marginal lines are much 

 broader and more distinctly marked, in all which characters Mr. Austin's 

 specimen and mine thoroughly agree. I am thus led to the conclusion 

 that either my specimen is Alaus go7'gops, or that Mr. Austin's is not. 



I have in my collection examples of A. oculatus varying in length from 

 42)/^ mm. to 25 mm. James T. Bell. 



Belleville, April 29th, 1881. 



