Lestes

Stephens, J. F., 1836, Illustrations of British Entomology; Mandibulata (excerpt), London: Baldwin and Cradock : 76-77

Genus VIII.— LESTES , Leach.

Wings narrow, thin and membranaceous, composed of numerous small areolets, the greater portion of which (especially towards the apex) are pentagonal, the fourth longitudinal nervure angulated; stigma oblong, rather large: abdomen slender, nearly linear, being a little dilated at the apex, which in the males is furnished with semicircular appendages, of the female with simple ones; w ings half expanded (as in Smerinthus) during repose. Mask of the larvae with a double projection on the upper edge of the mentum.

Prom Agrion the species of this genus are distinguished with facility by the areolets of the wings being more numerous, and by the greater portion of them towards the apex, especially on the margins, being either pentagonal or polygonal, rarely quadrangular, the fourth longitudinal nervure being much angulated in numerous zigzags; the stigma is oblong, and the males are distinguished by having the apex of the abdomen armed with curved forceps; yet, regardless of these obvious distinctions, these insects, as well as those of the preceding genus, were long considered as constituting one species only, and are thus considered in the latest works of the celebrated Latreille, although the discrepancies of the two genera were pointed out by Leach in 1810!!