596 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXVI. No. 670 



cast is most pronounced upon the more deli- 

 cately colored soft parts — the mesothorax, 

 metathorax and abdomen. This coloration 

 hardly agrees with that of the two specimens 

 described by Scudder, the female as "pale 

 coral-red verging on magenta " and the male 

 as " orange red." The present specimen is a 

 female and the green color of the common 

 form is replaced by red throughout. There 

 are only a few dark brown markings : on the 

 pronotum the lateral carinse are heavily 

 marked with deep brown and the tegmina 

 have a patch of the same color on the apical 

 portion of the dorsal field; at the sides the 

 tegmina show three rows of more or less con- 

 fluent brown spots, the upper row longest and 

 heaviest. There are many indistinct whitish 

 maeulations on the sides of the prothorax and 

 particularly dense upon the cheeks and the 

 face. The ocelli are opaque white. The eyes 

 are light gTay, creamy white along the inner 

 margin and in the middle, with irregular dark 

 blotches suffused with red. The tegmina show 

 many indistinct creamy maeulations. The 

 corneous portion of the wings, which projects 

 beyond the tegmina, is red, the membranous 

 portion hyaline with the network of veins rose- 

 red. The ovipositor is brown at the tip. The 

 legs are a slightly fuller crimson than the 

 body, the tibise and tarsi deeper colored than 

 the femora. The hind tibise are a very dark 

 crimson-brown. 



It should be noted that brown specimens of 

 Locustids occur occasionally and in some of 

 these there is a trace of pink, as it were, show- 

 ing through the brown. Some years ago the 

 writer took a specimen of Amblycorypha 

 ohlongifolia, near Springfield, Mass., of a pale 

 brown color suffused with pink. There is a 

 similar specimen in the National Museum col- 

 lection, taken at Dorsey, Md., August 20, 

 ^ 1904, by Miss E. Jones. It is such a specimen 

 that Mr. Shull describes in his article. 



It is a well-known fact that color variations 

 of the same character occur in many green 

 lepidopterous larvae.' Caterpillars showing 

 these variations in color may be found upon 

 the same food plant under the same condi- 

 tions ; these colors apparently do not depend 



upon any particular environment, but are 

 directly due to the insect's food. Incidentally 

 they are protective in most cases. Poulton in 

 his statement " that some of the colors of 

 certain Lepidopterous larvae are made up of 

 modified chlorophyll derived from the food- 

 plant " refers to this green or brown general 

 body-color.' Through experiment he reached 

 the conclusion that " etiolin, no less than 

 chlorophyll, can be transformed into a larval 

 coloring matter, which may be either green or 

 brown, and is so disposed as to form a ground 

 color. "^ It should be added that the processes 

 which produce the change from green to 

 brovsTi or red in chlorophyll are understood to 

 be of a very subtle nature. The colors of the 

 Locustidse are in aU probability of the same 

 origin. These insects are almost wholly phy- 

 tophagous and their coloration strongly re- 

 sembles in character that of the lepidopterous 

 larvae in question. In both cases, through the 

 rapid assimilation of food, the plant juices are 

 taken into the organism practically unaltered. 

 With the Lepidoptera these colors are elimi- 

 nated during the pupal period; in the Locus- 

 tidse, which reach maturity by a series of molts 

 and continue feeding in all stages, the colors 

 persist to the adult insect. Scudder has 

 already pointed out that season or temperature 

 are hardly admissible as agents in these color 

 variations.^ The pink or brown specimens ap- 

 pear at the same season with the green ones 

 and they occur among the Locustidse of the 

 tropics as well as with those of temperate 

 regions. Dr. Hose has called my attention to 

 the fact that at the New York Botanical Gar- 

 den, where the above-described red specimen 

 was taken, there is an abundance of crimson 

 foliage. It is, therefore, not improbable that 

 in this specimen the crimson color is due to 

 a coloring matter contained in the foliage upon 

 which the insect fed. 



Two methods of investigating these colors 

 of the Locustidse may be suggested : One is by 

 comparative spectroscopic tests of the coloring 

 matter of the insects and plants, the other is 



' Proc. Roy. Soo. London, Vol. 54, p. 41, 1893. 



' L. c, p. 426. 



'Entomological Neics, Vol. 12, p. 131, 1901. 



