NO. 11 24. RE VISION OF THE MELA N PLISC UDDER. 277 



quadrate or feebly longitudinal (male) or a little transverse (female), 

 scarcely or not longer than the closely punctate metazona. Prosternal 

 spine moderately long, erect, cylindrical, in the female slightly appressed, 

 blunt; interspace between mesosternal lobes fully half as long again 

 as broad (male) or feebly transverse (female). Tegmina generally sur- 

 passing a little the hind femora, of moderate breadth, distinctly tapering, 

 olivaceo-fuscous, immaculate or with a feeble line of minute maculations 

 along the discoidal area; wings hyaline, glistening and iridescent, with 

 pale fuscous veins darker next the apex. Fore and middle femora 

 scarcely tumid in the male; hind femora blackish olivaceous on the 

 outer face excepting sometimes on the lower margin, elsewhere flavous 

 or luteo-flavous,with two broad blackish olivaceous maculatious above, 

 especially on the inner side; hind tibiae feebly valgate, red, the spines 

 black excepting at base, eleven to thirteen in number in the outer 

 series. Extremity of male abdomen considerably clavate, somewhat 

 recurved, the supraanal plate subclypeate but mesially contracted, 

 apically rectaugulate, the margins considerably elevated, forming 

 deep valleys between them and the opposite curved ridges border- 

 ing the median sulcus; the latter is deep, gradually contracts toward 

 the middle and then rapidly expands and shallows (in the specimen 

 chosen for illustration the apical portion is concealed); furcula consist- 

 ing of a pair of basally adjacent, apically tapering, parallel, acuminate 

 fingers, nearly half as long as the supraanal plate, lying in the valleys 

 of the same; cerci subfalciform lamellae, which taper rapidly in the 

 basal half and beyond are less than half as broad, slightly incurved 

 and upcurved, apically tapering by the curve of the lower margin, the 

 tip blunt and falling short of the extremity of the supraanal plate; 

 subgenital plate broad at base, narrowing rapidly, the extremity hardly 

 more than half as broad as the base, the lateral margins strongly arcu- 

 ate, the apical margin even, entire, well rounded. 



Length of body, male 20 mm., female 25 mm. ; antennae, male 8.5 mm., 

 female 6.75 mm.; tegmina, male 17 mm., female 17.5 mm.; hind femora, 

 male 12 mm., female 13.25 mm. 



Fifteen males, 29 females. Colorado, 5,500 feet, Morrison (S. Hen- 

 shaw; S. H. Scudder; U.S.N.M. Riley collection); Pueblo, Colorado, 

 4,700 feet, August 30-31; Colorado Springs, El Paso County, Colorado, 

 August, E. S. Tucker (University of Kansas); Manitou, El Paso 

 County, Colorado (L. Bruner); Topeka, Shawnee County, Kansas, 

 October 31 ; Nebraska, Dodge. 



I )odge originally described it from Glencoe, Dodge County, Nebraska, 

 and it has since been recorded by Bruner from Canyon City, Fremont 

 County, Colorado, and the plains of Wyoming. 



This species, especially in life, is strikingly different from the next 

 two in coloring, though the male abdominal appendages are exceedingly 

 similar. According to Bruner. it is more clumsy in its movements than 

 M. femur -nibrutn. 



