112 Psyche [June 



Triatoma, is omitted here. The original descriptions of Neiva's 

 own species are transcribed in full, and bibliographic references 

 to the others are given. These descriptions, which deal almost 

 entirely with color characters and mention scarcely any struc- 

 tural details, are utterly worthless for the satisfactory identifica- 

 tion of the species, and it will be necessary to examine the types 

 in order definitely to fix the forms. This work is soon to be 

 undertaken by Mr. H. G. Barber and myself, and will be reported 

 later. 



A bibliography containing 97 titles is appended to the 

 "Revisao." 



The other paper, which Mr. Barber has very kindly brought 

 to my attention is the "Contribucion al estudio del gen. Triatoma 

 Lap." by Eduardo del Ponte, published in Vol. II of the "Revista 

 del Instituto Bacteriologico del Departamento Nacional de 

 Higiene, Buenos Aires," and dated March 1921. The first part 

 of this work, dealing with the anatomy of the Triatomas, is 

 original; the chapters dealing with the biology and the system- 

 atics of the group are frankly based on Neiva's "Revisao," yet 

 contain much additional material. Of particular interest is the 

 account of the so-called xenodiagnosis (Brumpt), which affords 

 an infallible method of diagnosing the early stages of suspected 

 trypanosomal diseases, when the trypanosomes are too few to be 

 detected readily by ordinary methods. Xenodiagnosis consists 

 essentially in allowing an uninfected Triatoma nymph to bite the 

 patient and to take up a considerable quantity of blood, after 

 which the insect is placed in an incubator at 30° C. If trypano- 

 somes were present in the patient, and were ingested by the 

 Triatoma, they multiply rapidly in the insect and may readily 

 be found. 



In his systematic treatment of the genus, Del Ponte has 

 made a very creditable effort to supply the deficiencies in Neiva's 

 "Revisao." He gives good figures and full descriptions of the 

 half-dozen species known to him {T. circummaculata, T. infestans, 

 T. platensis, T. rubrovaria, T. sordida, and T. vitticeps; and 

 desci'iption only of T. megista). In addition, he gives a full 

 translation of the best description available (usually that of 



