120 Journal New York Entomological Society. [Voi.vn. 



area, the pronotum black, with an angulate lateral pale spot ; elytral fascia par- 

 allel-sided and slightly oblique externally, the subapical spot oval and slightly 

 distant from the limb ; male with the abdomen impressed along the middle to- 

 ward tip and with the third segment medially bicuspid as usual in this group. 



Length 4.2-4.75 mm.; width 2.8-3.2 mm. Arizona dentipes Fabr. 



15 — Body very much smaller ; male with the head and pronotum pale yellowish- 

 white, the latter with a basal black area extending to lateral fifth or sixth, the 

 median part feebly bilobed and extending to apical fourth or fifth ; elytral spots 

 small, at the margin slightly behind basal third, near the apex and further from 

 the suture than limb, and at basal third and inner two-fifths ; under surface 

 black, the legs rather slender and pale ; sexual characters feeble. Length 

 2.5 mm.; width 1. 75 mm. Rhode Island indubitabilis Cr. 



Lepida is not represented in the material before me and bistripustu- 

 lata (= ery throe ephala) is represented by decora of the table ; the sec- 

 ond is allied to de?itipes but in the typical form has the two ante-median 

 spots separated, the inner the larger. The species from stellata to 

 bolli are more or less close derivatives of the ursina type and those 

 from soeialis to dentipes, probably including tau and quadrillum, which 

 I have not examined, may be considered as subspecies of the dentipes 

 type, but in each case the peculiarities of form, size or ornamentation 

 hold good through extended series. In fact, as in many other parts 

 of the Coccinellidse, we may have a succession of what can only be re- 

 garded as distinct forms, with all the fixed characteristics of species, 

 having an identical general scheme of ornamentation. This is evident 

 also in many other parts of the Coleoptera as in Cicindela, Omophron 

 and Heterocerus. Ornamentation may become in other words as im- 

 portant a generic structural character as any other special modification. 

 In the present tribe there is even an intergeneric similarity or parallel- 

 ism of ornamentation, as shown in B. decempustulata and Hyperaspis 

 troglodytes, which can scarcely be mutually distinguished superficially, 

 and the same is well known in Chilocorus and Exochomus, showing 

 that ornamentation in the Coccinellidre has been evolved for a useful 

 purpose and that it should form a correspondingly important criterion 

 in classification. 



Hyperaspis Chev. 



The tarsal claws seem to vary gradually and between somewhat 

 narrow limits in this genus, being occasionally almost simple, but I do 

 not find this character to be of much importance in classification and 

 have therefore not employed it at all. The comparative definition of 

 the species is difficult, as there is little or no structural variety and the 



