Prof. F. Dahl on Puliciphora. 99 



Calosoma irregulare, Walker. Vancouver. 



latercde, Kirby. Brazil. 



retusi(s, Fabr.* Patagonia. 



imtagoniense, Hope. Patagonia. 



tecjuJutum, Woll. Cape Verde Is. 



airvipes, Kirby. Brazil. 



helence, Hope. St. Helena. 



halujena, Woll. St. Helena. 



chinense, Hope. China. 



madercs, Fabr. Madeira. 



frigidum, Kirby. N. Amer. 



XIV. — Puliciphora, a neio Flea-Jike Genus of Diptera. 

 By Friedrich Dahl, of Kiel f. 



At last we appear to be obtaining a clue to the origin of the 

 flea : in sorting out my wholesale captures from the Bismarck 

 Archipelago I found a Phorid which, owing to the total loss 

 of wings and halteres, had acquired a great similarity to a 

 flea — a similarity that appears to be by no means confined to 

 purely external and adventitious characters. Since we are 

 still completely in the dark concerning the question with 

 what other family of insects the Pulicida3 are most closely 

 allied — there has even been a dispute as to the order to which 

 they are to be assigned — all data of this sort must be of 

 interest. 



For the form before me I establish a new genus, and since 

 it is intermediate between the Plioridfe and Pulicidee, I term 

 it Pulicijjhora. I designate the species lucifera, since it 

 appears for the first time to bring light to bear upon a dark 

 matter. The genus has decided affinity to the Pliorida3, and 

 I unhesitatingly assign it to this family. The antennte, 

 mouth-parts, legs, and female genital organs all agree 

 perfectly in type with the corresponding organs of the 

 members of the family in question. The genus, however, is 

 distinguished from almost all other known genera of the 

 family by the entire absence of wings and halteres, by the 

 unusually great reduction of the thorax, and by the eyes 

 being greatly reduced in size. The thorax^ which in the 

 winged genera of Phoridse is much longer and thicker than 

 the head, is here much smaller than the latter, a sign that the 



* This, I think, is certainly not the species known to me as alternans, 

 F., with which it is placed in Uemminger's Catalogue. The sixth inter- 

 stice of the elytra is a little narrower than the fifth aud seventh, which 

 are nearly smooth. 



t Translated by E. E. Austen from the ' Zoologischer Anzeiger,' 

 Bd. XX. No. 543 (October 21, 1897), pp. 40D-412. 



