May, '05] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 1 43 



few in which the cross-bands are entire. The facial tubercle 

 is a little darker in the specimen from Wyoming, and the legs 

 are entirely yellow, with the exception of the tarsi, which are 

 reddish. So far as I am aware the female of this species has 

 never before been reported. All of the type specimens are 

 males. Taken in August on Baldwin Creek. 



Syritta pipiens Linn^. 



This was the commonest of the Syrphidae. found everywhere 

 up to an elevation of 7,500 feet. Collected from June to Sep- 

 tember. 



Fleas and Disease. 

 By C. F. Baker. 



Estacion Agronomica, Santiago de las Vegas, Cuba. 



No less epoch-marking than the announcements first made of 

 the connection of mosquitoes with malaria and yellow fever is 

 the news which now comes through Dr. Ashmead, the leprosy 

 expert pf New York, that Dr. Carrasquillo, of Bogota, has 

 found the bacillus of Hansen in the intestinal canal of fleas. 

 The rapid progress of leprosy after introduction into some of 

 our flea-invested southern cities, from local endemicity to 

 alarming epidemicitj', is, according to Dr. Ashmead, probably 

 to be credited to inoculation by flea bites. 



In connection with the investigation of the relation of fleas 

 to bubonic plague, it has already been shown by the writer 

 (Proc. U. S. National Museum, Vol. XXVII, 1904^, that the 

 fleas of rats in the warmer regions of the earth are close rela- 

 tives of the flea specific to human beings, and thus, far more 

 likely to bite human beings than are the fleas of rats in the 

 colder regions, which are only distantly related to Pulex irri- 

 tans. It is now necessary to know if any of these southern rat 

 fleas — of which there are a number of species — voluntarily bite 

 human beings. 



These investigations, and now the new lines brought into 

 striking prominence by Dr. Ashmead's announcement, make it 

 of first importance that a complete study be made of all the 



