AKT. IB. NORTH AMERICAN SCELLUS GREENE. 3 



1. SCELLUS VIRAGO Aldrich. 



Plate 1, fig. 8 ; plate 2, figs. 15* and 19 ; plate 3, fig. 28. 

 Scellus virago Aldrich, Entomological News, 1907, April, p. 133. 



" Large species, with yellowish-brown wings and greatly elongated 

 antennae, with apical arista." 



^^ Mah. — Head densely yellowish-brown pollinose, the face more 

 ocher yellow ; eyes elongated vertically, the face slender ; about eight 

 black bristles behind the eye above, and a pair on the occiput ; anten- 

 nae inserted higher up, as long as the vertical diameter of the eye, 

 slender, the third joint nearly twice as long as the first two, with a 

 short two-jointed, apical arista. 



" Thorax thickly dusted, still with a faint coppery or rosaceous 

 reflection showing through on dorsum and sides. Pollen of the dor- 

 sum grayish in the middle, with two very fine lines in the center, 

 inclosing the single row of six or eight tiny, acrostichal bristles; 

 dorsocentral bristles in two rows, very small except the posterior 

 two of each row, with slight dots from which the separate bristles 

 arise ; along each side of the dorsum a darker pollinose stripe above 

 the pleural suture ; before the scutellum a median darker stripe, con- 

 tinuing the two fine median lines to the scutellum (the insertion of 

 the pin prevents my describing this more closelj^) ; scutellum more 

 bright coppery red, with two bristles ; pleura uniformly and densely 

 pollinose with gray, the coppery ground color but little visible. 

 Halteres yellow. 



" Abdomen less pollinose and more coppery than the thorax, of 

 four well-developed segments, the others modified; fourth segment 

 one-third as long as the preceding one ; the ' anal appendages ' arise 

 on the doi-sal side between the fourth and fifth segments they are a 

 pair of delicate organs, black at base, whitish beyond, each ending 

 in a spoon-shaped, orange-colored enlargement, which bears a dense 

 series of small, dark hairs along the outer side and a tuft of similar 

 ones on the inner apical angle ; third abdominal segment protuberant 

 below, the grasping organs of the hypopygium projecting behind it. 



"Legs blackish-green, somewhat pollinose, of complicated struc- 

 ture. Fore femora with the usual spines beneath ; fore tibiae with a 

 row of stiff hairs on the inner side beyond the middle and a stout 

 thumblike curved claw on the anterior side before the end ; also, with 

 a striking lobe or lappet on the inner side of the tip. Middle femora 

 slender, a little arcuated ; middle tibiae with a row of erect bristles 

 on the anterior side past the middle, and curled long hairs on the 

 posterior side at the tip. Hind femora, tibiae and tarsi of plain 

 structure, the tibiae without noticeable bristles at the tip. 



"Wings brownish-yellow on the basal half, more brown apically; 

 a large brown spot on the posterior cross-vein and another on the 



