37 



The species are all unknown to me, and therefore no type will be 

 designated. The generic name is too close to Platylabus (Wesmael, 

 Hym., 1S45) to stand, and may be supplanted by Labidophora 



PSALIDOPHORA* 



1839. Serv., Orth., 29 : proposed by Serville to supplant his earlier 



name Spongiphora ; the species enumerated 'are Lherminieri 



(from Guadaloupe), crocelpennis Serv. and hriinneipennis (from 



N. America). 



The type of Spongiphora was crocelpennis, and Serville proposes 



to change the name because (vid. Orth., p. 17) many entomologists 



had observed to him that the pad was extremely small, and could 



often not be seen in dried specimens. Since, however, it exists, the 



first name, involving no inaccuracy, should be retained. The other 



species added to the group in 1839, are strictly congeneric with the 



original sjjecies, and hence the name must be dropped. See Sphon- 



gophora. 



PSALIS. 



1831. Serv., Ann. Sci. Nat., xxii, 34: founded upon americana 

 Pal.-Bejiuv., and riparia (jnorbida) from an unknown locality. 

 As Serville afterwards (Orth., 20-21) points out, the generic'de- 

 scription of the abdomen is taken from individuals which had 

 been broken and repaired by gluing the abdomen on again helly 

 upward! Many of the peculiarities of the genus are taken 

 from features dependant upon this accident. Serville con- 

 sequently believes that the name should be suppressed, and 

 places the two species in Forficesila, between which genus and 

 Psalis he had, in 1831, interposed two genera. 



1838, Burm., Handb. d. Ent., ii, 753 : uses it doubtfully for one of 

 the sections into which he divides the single genus, Forficula, 

 accepted by him, and places in it americana (proce7-a) and ga- 

 gatina; riparia (gigantea) is placed under the section Forlices- 

 ila. Both on this account and because when the generic name 

 Psalis was proposed, riparia was the type of Labidura (Svn. 

 Forficesila), Psalis, if used at all, must take americana as its 

 type. Dohrn places both species in the genus Labidura, and 

 indeed at no great distance from each other. But they present 

 so many points of structural dissimilarity that they should be 

 generically separated. 



