REHN AND HEBARD 17 



area on its face above the clypeus. Unfortunately Serville says 

 this is transverse, which is never true of concinnum, but frequently 

 in drying out, individuals of a number of the species show black 

 areas below the eyes and to a similar feature we feel he must 

 refer. The other characters given for herbaceum are few and 

 generally non-diagnostic, except that the ovipositor is twelve 

 lines long and lightly concave dorsad, a condition occurring in 

 but a few species. Of these fidicinium alone would at all answer 

 the other points of the description and of the identity of the two 

 we are not at all convinced, J:»ut we are placing the older name 

 with a query under the more recent name, waiting for future 

 examination of the original material, if such still exists, to deter- 

 mine the matter. 



The description of Walker's validum we have examined very 

 carefully, and have also had through the kindness of Mr. A. N. 

 Caudell the notes made by the latter on the type of the species, 

 which Kirby considered to be the same as nigripes. The original 

 description is very insufficient and Mr. Caudell comments as 

 follows on the specimen; " Last year I saw also his type of validum, 

 but without material for comparison I could not definitely deter- 

 mine what it is. I am very sure it is not the same as our nigripes. 

 The type is a unique female and the following note was hurriedly 

 made regarding it while I was in London." We are unable to 

 definitely say what the insect is, but it appears to l)e nearer 

 nigripes than anything else. However, it seem^; best to await 

 more complete study of the original material and we have pro- 

 visionally placed the name with a query under nigripes. 



Of the new species described by Redtenl)acher in his paper on 

 the subfamily, i. e., rohustum, inerme, nitidum, spinulosum and 

 laticauda, we are able to easily dispose of three, these being 

 inerme, nitidum and spinulosum. The first of these was admit- 

 tedly proposed to replace longipennis Scudder, which equals 

 concinnum. Regarding nitidum and spinulosurn we had formed 

 definite conclusions, when through the kindness of Mr. W. T. 

 Davis we were placed in possession of copies of correspondence 

 which passed between that gentleman, Mr. Caudell and Doctors 

 Karny and Holdhaus relative to this subject. A portion of a 

 series of specimens used by the latter gentlemen for comparison 

 has also been placed in our hands so that we are thus al)le to 



TRANS. AM. ENT. SOC, XLI. 

 2 



