CURRENT NOTES. 351 



^■URRENT NOTES. 



In the November no. of Psyche, ScmMer gives an account of the 

 species of Murmecophila occurring in the United States. Passin;^ over 

 the very doubtful note by Harris, these curious little crickets were 

 first recorded by Bruner, in 18.S4, as occurring in North America. 

 In this paper, Scudder includes five species, from very widely scattered 

 localities. 



A few pages further in the same journal, he compares the census 

 of European and United States Orthoptera-Fauna. Europe is richer 

 in earwigs, but is surpassed by the States in lUattodea, Ma)itodca and 

 Phasijiatodea, while of the Aeridiodea we have only 148 species against 

 their 534 ; although we have i\io Pyrgoinaipiddae and 84 Pauipkaifidae 

 which are unrepresented in America, we are far outnumbered in the 

 other groups. The United States appear to be poor in Locustodea, for 

 we have the advantage in every group, except the Stenopdniatidac, 

 where they have 77 against our five. Several of our families in this 

 group are not represented in America. In crickets, too, we are beaten, 

 having 33 species against the American 04. Altogether our grand 

 total is 471 species, while 856 are included on the American list. The 

 author notes that his list of the European forms is entirely taken from 

 Brunner's Prodromus ; of course the great additions made since the 

 appearance of this work would bring up the European total very con- 

 siderably. 



Scudder has just published a short paper on Tropi::aspis and (Jacop- 

 tfris, two genera of American Decticidac. The former genus was 

 established by Brunner, without actually receiving any species, in his 

 " Revision " in 1893. Scudder notices five species, of which four are 

 new, and he includes in it the Arytropteris stcidiiacheri, Herman. Of 

 Cacoptcrin. he describes seven species, all new. 



The Rev. F. D. Morice exhibited at the meeting of the Ent. 

 Soc. of London, held on October 4th, three female specimens of 

 Kxoneura libanemU, Friese, taken at Brumana on Mount Lebanon, 

 near Beirut ; and, for comparison with them, he showed two specimens 

 of Ceratina cucurhitina, Rossi, from Switzerland. He commented upon 

 the remarkable distribution of the genus Kxoneura, Smith, and said 

 this genus has been hitherto recorded only from Australia. Mr. 

 Gahan remarked upon the difhculty of accounting for the distribution 

 of many genera of insects, and pointed out that the case brought 

 under their notice by Mr. Morice was closely paralleled by that of the 

 coleopterous genus 7^('Z«ii((s, of which two species were, so far, known only 

 from Australia, while the third was almost entirely confined to Europe. 



The second part of Die PalaearktUchen (jrussschntetteiiinye and Hire 

 Xaturyescltichte (published by Ernst Heyne, Leipzig) has been issued. 

 It contains the greater part of the species of the genus Peilepldla, and 

 those dealt with appear to be as carefully described and their life- 

 histories worked out as fully as those in the preceding part. 



As supplementary to his previous works on the Mallophwia, Pro- 

 fessor Kellogg has now issued (Government Printing Ollice, Washing- 

 ton, U.S.A.) "A list of the Mallojihaya taken from birds and mammals 

 of North America." He gives also an account of the bibliography of 

 the group, and a brief sununary of the facts leadhig to the mode of 

 classification adopted. He states that " the latest classification of 

 insects assigns to the Malluphui/a the position of an independent order. 



