374 CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. [Proc. 3D Ser. 



Subfamily AGRIONINJE. 



2. Archilestes grandis Rambur. 



Lestes grandis Ramb., Ins. Nevr., 1842, p. 244. 



Archilestes grandis Calvert, Proc. Cal. Acad. Sci., 2nd Ser., Vol. IV, 

 1893-94, p. 475, PL XV, figs. 10 and 11. 



The male taken in November has the terminus of the 

 dilated part of the middle of the superior appendages a well- 

 defined tooth. 



2 $ 1 ? Tepic, Oct., 1894, Eisen and Vaslit. 

 1 $ 1 ? " Nov., 1894, " 



33 2? 



Since the publication of my report on the Baja Califor- 

 nian Odonata cited above, Mr. McLachlan has published 1 

 the description of another Archilestes, A. calif or nica, based 

 on one adult male from "California" by Henry Edwards. 

 This has led to some correspondence between us on the 

 question of the relationship of the Baja Californian speci- 

 mens, which I referred to grandis, and calif ornica. Hav- 

 ing sent a pair of the former to Mr. McLachlan, he has 

 compared them with his type and also with his series of 

 grandis. By his kind permission I present his results here : 



"Your letter * * * has induced me to look into my long series of 

 grandis from Texas, interior of Mainland of Mexico, Costa Rica, and Vene- 

 zuela. I take first your Baja Californian examples. There can, I think, be 

 no doubt that these form a local race of grandis. I find great variability in 

 the latter, and the Venezuelan examples in my collection seem worthy of a 

 racial name. In these the thorax is almost wholly bronzy black, there being 

 only the sutural indications of a pale humeral line, and two very narrow, yel- 

 low, lateral lines, the dark color practically invading the whole. 



"With regard to my type of A. californica, I think I must regard it also 

 as a race of grandis. But unless it be an exceedingly teneral individual it is 

 a race of a very marked character. As an argument against its being teneral 

 there is the fact that pruinosity has distinctly commenced. The ground-color 

 of the insect is distinctly pale brown, ochreous brown or grayish brown (not 

 yellow), and the entire abdomen may be said to be pale brown (darker after 

 the sixth segment). With respect to the appendages ( S ),.the inferiors strike 

 me as blunter than in typical examples [of grandis], but this is not trust- 

 worthy from a single specimen. That the color largely influenced me in 



1 Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., 6th Ser., Vol. XVI, 1895, p. 20. 



