380 ERNEST A. BACK. 



the second segment to tip, the lateral margins and venter are white 

 pruinose. Legs reddish; all the femora dark on the outer posterior 

 side; the front and middle pairs more so. All the tibiae and tarsal 

 segments darker toward tips, with pale yellowish pile and reddish bris- 

 tles. Wings narrower than in C . sodalis Osten Sacken, brownish, much 

 darker on costal margin than on outer margin ; toward the apex on the 

 anterior margin is a small white spot. 



9. — Like the male, but face is grayish- white pruinose; front deep 

 brownish; there are no silvery- white spots on thorax, and the wings 

 are not as uniformly brown but present a more mottled appearance. 

 The costal margin is still much darker and the white spot is present, 

 but all the posterior, anal, axillary and discal cells, and the base of 

 the second submarginal and second basal cells are also much paler. 



Type.—U. C. Z. 



Habitat. — Texas (Belfrage). 



? Coplmra brevicornls. 



Taracticus brevicornis Williston, Trans. Am. Ent. Soc, XI, 22, 



PI. II, fig. 3. 1884: XII, 54, refers to Aphamartania. 

 f Cophura brevicornis Williston, Biologia, Dipt., I, 314, refers 

 here with a doubt. 



"(J' 9- — Length 7-9 mm. — Antennae short, about as long as the 

 distance from antennae to oral margin; style distinct, acute, termin- 

 ating in a microscopic bristle; legs brownish-red, blackish toward the 

 tips of tarsi; abdomen polished black, with a white spot on the pos- 

 terior angles of the second, third, fourth and fifth segments. 



Front and face silvery-white, the bristles on the oral margin, ocelli 

 and the finer ones along the lateral margins of the front black. Face 

 broader than in octopunctatus, being very nearly square, the distance 

 from antennae to oral margin scarcely greater than that between the 

 eyes. Antennae black, the first two segments with black bristles 

 below; short, not as long as the height of the head; first segment a 

 little longer than the second; third segment slender, not more than 

 twice the length of the first two taken together; style rather slender, 

 not as long as the second antennal segment, terminating in a micro- 

 scopic bristle. Dorsum of thorax thickly covered with brownish 

 ochraceus bloom, with two very indistinct darker, brownish median 

 stripes in front. Pleurae gray pruinose. Abdomen of equal width, 

 gently convex above, black, polished, lightly punctate, the posterior 

 angles of the second, third, fourth and fifth segments with a small 

 quadrate silvery spot, the narrow anterior margins of the same seg- 

 ments less distinctly whitish-silvery. Legs brownish-red, all the 

 tarsi reddish-brown, blackish at tips. Wings like those of T. octopunc- 

 tatus, nearly pure hyaline." 



Type. — University of Kansas. Two specimens. 



