398 Mr. G. W. Kirkaldy on the 
the exception of certain minor differences in the ventral 
abdominal segments and the proportions of the scu- 
tellum, I am unacquainted with any other such cha- 
racters; while several structural features, largely 
employed for diagnostic purposes in other groups of 
Rhynchota, appear to be vaiueless in Nofonecta. The 
sculpture of the head and pronotum, and the colour 
and pattern of the hemielytra are not constant, although 
a more or less bright crimson or scarlet dorsum 
abdominis seems to be characteristic of N. insulata, 
W. Kirb., and N. montezwma, Kirk., and a rich black 
and yellow metanotum and dorsum abdominis of N. 
glauca, var. maculata, Fabr. | 
Unless otherwise mentioned, the scutellum, meta- 
notum and sterna are black, the sternal hairtufts varying 
from bronze-yellow to dark bronze-brown. 
Melanochroism and leuco¢hroism are more marked in 
this genus than in any other of the Rhynchota with 
which I am acquainted. I have examined melanochroic 
individuals of six species, viz.: N. glauca (nigra and mar- 
ginata), N. undulata, N. americana, N. variabilis, N. lac- 
titans (stygica), and N. mexicana, while certain examples. 
of NV. irrorata, N. shooterti, N. triguttata and N. insulata 
have almost a right to the name. : 
N. lutea has been treated as a separate species; but it 
may perhaps be regarded more correctly as a nearly 
stable leucochroic race of N. glauca; an African form of 
N. glauca, var. maculata, is generally concolorous, dark 
luteous. Similarly coloured (though much lighter) forms 
occur commonly in N. undulata, N. americana, N. 
shooterii, and probably in other species. 
A noteworthy fact is that, with the exception of 
N. undulata, N. americana, one or two N. shooteric 
and the luteous form of maculata (which, strictly 
speaking, is not leucochroic), all the luteous specimens, 
some forty or fifty, that I have seen, have unequal-lobed 
membranes. Dr. Bergroth kindly pointed out this 
peculiarity in N. lutea; {was at tirst inclined to regard 
it as a specific character, but found this view to be pre- 
mature on meeting with luteous examples of N. shooterti 
(q.v.), some with ordinary, some with semi-developed 
lobes. 
Unless otherwise indicated, it may be assumed that. 
the head, pronotum, and pedes are greenish testaceous,. 
