326 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. VOL.XX. 



106. MELANOPLUS PLEBEJUS. 

 (Plate XXII, fig. 2.) 



Pezotettix plebejm STAL, Bill. K. Sv. Vet.-Akad. Handl., V, No. 9 (1878), p. 12. 

 Pezotettix pupacformis SCUDDER!, Proc. Bost. oc. Nat. Hist., XX, (1879), pp. 



83-84; Cent. Orth. (1879), pp. 72-73. BRUNER, Rep. U. S. Ent. Comm., Ill 



(1883), p. 59. 



Of medium or slightly above medium size. Head not prominent, the 

 vertex feebly turnid, scarcely elevated above the pronotum, the inter- 

 space between the eyes half as broad again (male) or twice as broad 

 (female) as the first autennal joint; fastigium rather steeply declivent, 

 broad, shallow, enlarging slightly in front, the bounding walls low and 

 rounded; frontal costa moderate, equal, as broad as (male) or slightly 

 narrower than (female) the interspace between the eyes, flat, sunken a 

 little at the ocellus, and in the female sulcate below it, biseriately 

 punctate above ; eyes large, rather prominent, very much longer, espe- 

 cially in the male, than the infraocular portion of the geuae; antennae 

 fully two-thirds (male) or a little more than one-half (female) as long as 

 the hind femora. Pronotuin simple, equal, the front margin a little full, 

 the hind margin gently angulated; median carina distinct though 

 rather slight, equal; lateral carinae rounded off; prozona faintly and 

 distantly, metazona abundantly but not deeply punctate; prozona dis- 

 tinctly longitudinal and similar in the two sexes, fully half as long 

 again as the metazona. Prosternal spine large, long, subcyliudrical, 

 blunt, a little retrorse; interspace between mesosternal lobes three times 

 (male) or one and a half, rarely two, times (female) as long as broad. 

 Tegmina abbreviate, overlapping, obovate, about as long as the prono- 

 tum, less than twice as long as broad, the curves of the costal and inner 

 margins similar, the tip acutangulate. Male abdomen long and slender, 

 the extremity clavate, somewhat recurved, the supraaual plate trian- 

 gular, sharply pointed, fully as long as broad, the sides straight; furcula 

 consisting of a pair of minute, rounded, approximate, flattened lobes, 

 as long as broad; cerci with the basal half tapering by the rapid slop- 

 ing of the upper edge so as to be half as broad in the middle as at base, 

 beyond broadening again somewhat on the same side, so that the apical 

 half is subspatulate, continuous with the basal part but strongly 

 incurved, externally deeply channeled, the tip broadly rounded, the 

 whole about as long as the last joint of the fore tarsi; subgenital plate 

 very small and narrow, tumid, apically subtuberculate, the apical 

 margin slightly elevated, entire. 



The general color is a griseous brown, excepting the abdomen which 

 is brownish testaceous; beneath clay yellow; the antennae are yellow 

 at the base, darkening beyond to fuscous ferruginous; from behind 

 the eye a broad black band extends across the prozona, generally 

 enlivened on the geuae by an oblique yellow streak, which in the 



