Some time ago in examining our species of ant lions I noticed that our two large genera, Myrmeleon and Brachynemurus, could readily be separated by the position of the origin of the radial sector; in one much nearer to the base of the wing than in the other. The characters previously used for Brachynemurns, as the forked costal veinlets, the length of the tibial spurs, etc., had not been satisfactory; and the discovery of this distinction led me to examine the other forms of the family with a view to their better classification.

Thomas Say described one species of Psychoda from the United States; Walker descrbied another from Hudson's Bay; and Dr. Williston, in Entom. News, 1893, described a third species from New York. I have noticed in the vicinity of Sea Cliff, N. Y., seven species, only one of which I have identified as previously described. Most of the forms I have collected are probably common elsewhere in the Eastern States and in Canada.

Very few Phalangids have been collected on our mountains, and so it is not surprising that a new species of a genus which in Europe lives in high altitudes should be found on Mt. Washington, New Hampshire. Early in September 1893, Mrs. Annie T. Slosson kindly sent me several vials of arachnids from the White Mts., and among them o vial from Mt. Washington containing six specimens of a beautiful new species of Oligolophus. It differ from the other American species which have been referred to that genus in lacking spines to the femur of the palpus, thus resembling some alpine European forms.

Upon looking over the specimens of this family, which I had collected during the past few years near Ithaca, I discovered a new species of Chernes, which may be characterized as follows:-

Chernes pallidus, nov. spec. Length about 2 mm.; body ovate oblong; cephalothorax a little broader behind than in front; finely serrulate on the margin; body finely granulate and furnished with short, yellowish, clavte hairs.

Length, 13. mm.; ceph., 4.2 mm long, 3 mm. wide. Cephalothorax very dark brown, covered with blackhairs, clypeus with white hairs and some white scales on the lower sides; a bunch of stiff hairs behind the eyes of second row; mandibles red-brown, iridescent greenish near tip; sternum brown with black hairs. Abdomen black, a narrorw basal line of white, and broad side stripes of white which do not quite reach to the tip; just beyond the middle the side stripes indent the central black area; sides black and venter blackish; legs black, bases of metatarsi reddish. The cephalothorax is moderately high, narrower than in the allied species, the quadrangle wider behind, the anterior row much curved, the S. E. small and well separated from the M.E., the eyes of second row almost twice as near to the lateral as to the dorsal. The posterior metatarsi are more slender than usual, and spined only at tip.

The author has frequently been asked why he did not make a key for the families of spiders. He has answered that a correct key was impossible.But as such questions are getting more numerous, and connected with a desire to know something about spiders, the author has decided to put together what he could as a contribution to the classification of our spiders, principally for the use of those who are unable to obtain the costly works necessary for study.

The Dysderidœ is a small family of spiders occupying in a certain respect an intermediate postion between the Tetrapneumones and the Dipneumones; the openings to the tracheæ are just behind the lung-slits, so that they may appear to have four lungs. The eyes are six in all of our forms. The mandibles are not small, in Dysdera quite large. The male palpi are quite simple in structure.

In identifying Chrysopidae from the South and West I have come across some new species, a few specimens have been in the collection for years, but more specimens have shown their distinctness. Correction is made of a misidentification in my Revision of the Chrysopidae and three Cuban forms have been taken in Florida.

The two subfamilies may, I believe, be farther separated by the fact that the Cheliferinœ have the dorsal scutæ of the abdomen divided by a median line; while in the Obisinœ the scutæ are entire. Chernes pallidus, Banks which was descirbed as having the median line wanting, really has a median line, through on account of the light colour of the abdomen it is very difficult to trace. The Cheliferinœ have an apophysis or small stylet near the end of the mandibular finger.

Poecilochroa minuta, n. sp.

Length ♂, 4 mm.; ceph., 1.7 mm. long, 1.1 broad, patella plus tibia IV., 1.6 mm. Cephalothorax uniform reddish yellow, legs and palpi a trifle paler, except metatarse IV. which are reddish brown; sternum yellowish; abdomen black, with short white hairs and some longer black ones at base; venter with a pale streak each side; spinnerets red-brown. Head narrow; posterior eyre row slightly recurved, longer than anterior row, the P. M. E. round, their diameter apart and a near the P. S. E. as to each other, equal in size; eyes of anterior row subequal, all close rogether. No plate under fang of mandibles. Legs quite hairy, but the scopulas not dense; femora with three of four very large spines above, each spine longer than the posterior eye row; no spine above on tibia IV., one below at tip of tibia I. Sternum narrow, nearly twice as long as wide. Abdomen slender no wider than cephalothorax, sipnnerets large, an interrupted ventral fold near their base. The tibia of the male palpus has on the outer tip a large, stout, slightly curved projection one-half the length of the tarsus and blunt pointed at tip; the palpal organ is swollen near middle, the style is short.

If one compares the tarsal comb of a Psammochares with the front tarsus of a typical Anoplius he will see that in the Psammochares there is a spine from the middle of the second tarsal joint about as long as that from the tip of the first or tip of second joint, while in the typical Anoplius there are spines along the first joint and at the tip of the first and second joints that are fairly long; there is none from the middle of the second joint at all comparable to them.

The family Phalangidæ is readily seperable from the other families of Phalangida by having but one simple (not compound) claw at the end of each tarsus and having a claw af the end of palpus.