INDIAN DRAGONFLIES. 925 



across the subcostal space, nearly to the outer end of the cubital space 

 and then curving strongly to the tornus ; in others the marking is 

 almost as extensive as in the male, but the cell middles are usually clear 

 and give a characteristic stippled appearance to the wing base. 



Hab. The insect is found locally in many parts of India from far North 

 to far South. I have not seen it among material sent from the North-West 

 nor from Burma. It is reported from Ceylon. My own specimens have 

 almost all been taken in the Deccan where I have found it to be very local 

 and I have also taken it in Madras, but not in Bombay. It is a shy and 

 very active insect and not easily captured. Rough nullahs and the rocky 

 shores of streams and rivers are its favourite haunts and in such places 

 it is invariably seen settled on rocks or such like bare spots, where its 

 brilliant orange red colouring makes it a conspicuous object. The females 

 are rare and are only found, when coming to water ior purposes of ovi- 

 positing. I have had to haunt the j)laces where the males congregated 

 for days together before I succeeded in capturing a specimen. 



60. Trithemis festiva, Brauer, 1868, Selys, 1879, Kirby, 1886. 



Libellula carnatica, Fabr., 1798. 

 Libellula festica, Kambur, 1842. 

 Libellula ivjerncdis, Brauer, 1865. 

 Dytheviis infernalis, Brauer, 1866. 

 Trithemis infernalis, Brauer, 1868, Selys, 1878. 

 Trithemis prosperina, Selys, 1878, Kirby, 1890. 

 Libellula cyprica, Martin ? 

 Trithemis cyprica, Martin, 1894. 



Male : Expanse 60 mm. Length 35 mm. 



Head : eyes deep purple above or dark brown with a purple sheen, slate 

 blue at the sides and beneath ; vesicle and upper part of forehead glossy 

 metallic violet ; epistome and labrum dark olivaceous brown with a darker 

 brown middle or the labrum black with a brown base ; labium blackish 

 brown , occiput dark brown. 



Protborax deep indigo blue. 



Thorax black, but appearing purple owing to a thin pruinescence. 



Abdomen black, the first three segments only with bluish pruinescence. 



Legs black. 



Wings hyaline but sometimes in old specimens faintly tinted; stigma 

 black ; a basal marking in the hindwing which varies in size and den- 

 sity, usually there is a dark, smoky brown ray in the inferior costal space 

 and another in the cubital space, the former not reaching the first anteno- 

 dal nervure, the latter extending beyond the cubital nervure. From the 

 cubital space the marking is continued in an even curve to nearly as far 

 as or to the tornus. Little variation in the neuration of this insect is 

 seen. 



Sexual organs : male : lamina low and broad, its surface coated with 

 bright brown hairs ; external tentaculse quadrangular, the internal short 

 and strongly hooked backward ; the lobe small, pointed and narrow, 

 arched more than in the other species. 



Teneral forms of the male are much livelier coloured and approach that 

 of the female. With the exception of the upper part of forehead and 

 labrum, the face is a bright greenish yellow ; the labium similarly coloured. 



Thorax bright greenish yellow with black markings as follows : — a moder- 

 ately broad middorsal fascia split by the mid-dorsal carina which is yellow, 

 a broad humeral stripe and laterally three oblique stripes connected above 

 with each other; the tergum and interalar sinus yellow. 

 6 



