1903- CarpeJnTKR & B^R:esi^ORD.— Vespa austriaca &> V. rtcfa. 225 



viii.). The face of F. rufa has a central black anchor mark, 

 and a rather small and narrow yellow crown mark is found on 

 the black area above (fig. i), while in V- austriaca the '* crown 

 mark " is large and deep, and the face, almost immacu- 

 late 3^ellow (fig. i) in the male, shows in the female three black 

 specks of varying size (see Cuthbert's figures, 97B). More- 

 over, the clypeus of F. austriaca is decidedly concave on the 

 lower edge (fig. i.-v.). The scape of the feeler is black in the 

 female of V. rufa, and often in the male also (fig. i), while in 

 V. austriaca it has a strong yellow patch in both sexes (figs, 

 i., iii., iv.). The black abdominal markings of F. rufa are 

 edged by ill-defined reddish areas (fig. 12), while those of V. 

 austriaca stand out clearly from the lemon-yellow ground 

 colour (fig xii.). The puncturation of V, 7'uja is coarser than 

 that of V. austriaca. The general appearance of V. austriaca 

 is well seen from the figures of Ormerod ('68,- pi. 3) and 

 Cuthbert ('97, pi. 3). 



Examination of the large series of these wasps that have 

 passed through our hands shows that most of these characters 

 are fairly constant. In no case have we found any wasp 

 that can be considered as exactly intermediate between 

 V. rufa and V. austriaca — none that could give rise to hesi- 

 tation as to which of the two forms it should be placed with. 

 But we have found a number of specimens of F. rufa that 

 show very marked variation in the direction of V. austriaca, 

 and a smaller number of specimens of the latter that approach 

 in some respects towards V. 72 fa. 



Three characters only seem to be absolutely distinctive : — 

 (i) The shins of V. austriaca are always hairy ; those of 

 V, rufa never. (2) The male armature of V. rufa is always, 

 as Robson has pointed out ('98), more robust and darker than 

 that of V. a7istriaca. (3) V. rufa has the integument more 

 coarsely punctured. All the other characters show more or 

 less variation in different individuals of the two forms, and 

 some of the most striking of these variations will be found 

 figured on Plate 2. 



Taking, in the first place, the head -markings, a black 

 anchor-mark on the face (fig. i) characterises V. rufa, while 

 the male of V. austriaca has typically an unspotted yellow 

 face (fig. i.) which shows only the slightest traces of the black 



