146 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST, 



distinct from M. stricta (ferrea), and I think the type must now be with 

 Mr. Neumoegen. It should be easily recognized. Prof. Smith has seen 

 the types and recognizes the validity of twenty-nine (29) species of N. Am. 

 Mamestra described by me. There remains then lubens to be reinstated 

 and ferrealis to be again recognized, making thirty-one in all. I have 

 l^st four others through comparisons with Mr. Walker's "types." 



FOLDED WINGS IN FCENUS. 



BY W1V« HAMPTON PATTON. 



Aside from the wasps distinguished by their folded wings (Diplop- 

 tera) and the Chalcidian genus Leucospis, there is no record, unless of 

 distant date, of any Hymenopterous insect having the wings folded. In 

 Copt era the " longitudinal fold " described by Say is in reality a pleat or 

 ridge : the wings, as I have repeatedly observed in the living insect, being 

 laid flat upon the back and never folded. 



I can, however, add from personal observation the Evaniad genus 

 Fcetius, in which I have uniformly found the wings folded in a manner 

 homologous to that of the hornets and Leucospis {i. e., longitudinally 

 through the middle, the fold crossing the median transverse vein and the 

 two recurrents, the 'posterior half of the wing falling under the anterior 

 half). 



The position of the wing-fold is one of great morphological signifi- 

 cance, as it indicates the line of separation between the two systems of 

 veins in insect wings. The discovery of this fold in Evaniadae proves 

 the recently discovered relationship between these insects and the 

 Diplopteryga. 



On the eighth of May, 1879, at Waterbury, Conn., I bred a female 

 specimen (of the common small species of Foenus) from a larva found in 

 the pith of a dead sumach twig in the preceding month. As no descrip- 

 tion of the larva of this genus exists, it is doubtful whether the larva 



found was that belonging to the Hymenopteron or was that of its host. 

 The larva was apodous, of a very slight purple shade, and covered with 

 fine down. There was no cocoon. The pupa is gray, the cast skin 

 almost white, showing the peculiar features of the genus Fa'tius. 



