52 INSECUTOR INSCITI^ MENSTRUUS 



In pullatus the two spines of basal lobe are approximate and 

 longer, and the basal appendages are more strongly setose. 

 The two species are very close, however. 



Types, 1 male and 12 females, No. 22714, U. S. Nat. Mus. ; 

 Alps, Province Sondrio, Italy, as follows : M. Merigio, 1800 m., 

 July 17, 1900; Scais, 1500 m., July 19, 1901; Venina, 1600 m., 

 August 8, 1903; Chiareggio, 1700 m., August 9, 1903; Campo 

 Moro, 2000 m., August, 1903 (M. Bezzi). Also Cusiano, 

 August, 1908 (M. Bezzi), the specimens in poor condition and 

 not positively determined. Five paratypes returned to Prof. 

 Dr. M. Bezzi. 



Doctor Bezzi kindly calls my attention to Aedes jiigornm 

 Vill. (Bull. Soc. Ent. France, 1919, 59, 1919), as possibly 

 identical with this species. Villeneuve's description of the col- 

 oration of the mesonotum is not unlike the present form; but 

 he passes over the genitalia with a brief description evidently 

 made with a hand-lens. It is therefore impossible to say 

 whether metalepticus is the same as jugorum or not. In these 

 insects, the male organs are so characteristic and important for 

 determination that it is surprising to find an eminent author 

 like Doctor Villeneuve disparage them, as he does in the 

 article referred to. "Ce sont des organes trop freles pour etre 

 employes dans une diagnose." Needless to say, our disagree- 

 ment is profound. 



It occurred to me as possible that this might be the same as 

 Aedes alpinus Linn., described from Lapland. Linnaeus might 

 easily have included a composite of several species with black 

 tarsi of the nemorosus group, so that the name would have to 

 be restricted. In that case alpinus would have to be applied 

 to the commonest of the Aedes with black tarsi that frequent 

 the mountains of Lapland, whichever that may be found to be. 

 Linnaeus' description, however, is unusually full. His account 

 (Flora Lapponica, 364, 1737) has been kindly put into English 

 for me by Mr. August Busck, and reads as follows. The ac- 

 count in the second edition of the Flora Lapponica is in Latin, 

 and is simply a translation of the Swedish of the first edition : 

 "Culex alpinus. Quite like the foregoing [Culex vulgaris, a 



