NO. 1 124. HE VISION OF THE MELANOPLISC UDDER. 321 



103. MELANOPLUS LEPIDUS, new species. 

 (Plate XXI, fig. 9.) 



lightly below medium size, blackish fuscous, with a feeble ferrugi- 

 nous tinge. Head not prominent, testaceous, very heavily flecked and 

 punctate and often suffused with fuscous, above almost wholly blackish 

 fuscous, with -a slender testaceous stripe separating the dark vertex 

 from the broad, piceous, postocular band; vertex gently tumid, dis- 

 tinctly elevated above the prouottim, the interspace between the eyes 

 scarcely broader than (male) or nearly twice as broad as (female) the 

 first antenna! joint; fastigium steeply declivent, deeply (male) or mod- 

 erately (female) sulcate throughout: frontal costa percurrent, faintly 

 narrowed above in the male, otherwise equal, as broad as the interspace 

 between the eyes, sulcate at and below the ocellus, punctate through- 

 out, above biseriately; eyes moderately large, rather prominent, espe- 

 cially in the male, somewhat longer than the iufraocular portion of the 

 genae; antennae castaneous, nearly five-sixths (male) or hardly three- 

 fifths (female) as long as the hind femora. Prouotum subequal, faintly 

 expanding posteriorly throughout (female) or only on the metazona 

 (male), the lower portion of the lateral lobes ferrugineo-testaceous, 

 the upper piceous, at least on the prozoua, and sometimes obscurely so 

 on the metazona, the disk broadly convex and passing by a scarcely 

 augulate well-rounded shoulder, nowhere with a semblance of lateral 

 cariuae, into the vertical lateral lobes; median carina very slight, on 

 the prozona subobsolete; front margin truncate, hind margin obtus- 

 angulate; prozona longitudinal (male) or quadrate (female), sparsely, 

 coarsely, and very shallowly punctate, about half as long again as the 

 finely and closely punctate metazona. Prosternal spine rather long, 

 conical, erect, very blunt, feebly appressed, a little shorter and coarser 

 in the female than in the male; interspace between mesosternal lobes 

 nearly half as long again as broad (male) or quadrate (female). Tegmina 

 abbreviate, about as long as the pronotum, attingent or feebly over- 

 lapping, broad ovate, nearly or somewhat less than twice as long as 

 broad, apically augulate, blackish fuscous. Fore and middle femora 

 somewhat tumid in the male; hind femora slender, particularly in the 

 female, dull ferrugineo-testaceous, generally very broadly bifasciate 

 with fuscous, and the whole geniculation fuscous, but these markings 

 often more or less suffused and confused, the lower face warm testa- 

 ceous; hind tibiae glaucous or dark glaucous, generally paler at the 

 base, with a glaucous or fusco glaucous patellar animlus, the spines 

 black beyond the pallid base, eleven to thirteen in number in the outer 

 series. Extremity of male abdomen considerably clavate and recurved, 

 the supraanal plate triangular, with feebly angulate sides and sub- 

 acutaugulate apex, the margins gently elevated, the median sulcus 

 equal, percurrent, moderately broad, rather deep, between sharp but 

 little elevated walls, with a straight median transverse plica; furcula 

 Proc. N". M. vol. xx 21 



