444 ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY 



MAY 3, 1900. 



The 1520! regular meeting was held at the residence of Mr. 

 Frank E. Chapin, 54 R street N.E. President Gill in the chair, 

 and Messrs. Morris, Dyar. Caudell, Benton, Ashmead, Kotinsky, 

 Busck, Chapin, Howard, Marlatt, and Sanderson also present. 

 The Corresponding Secretary read a letter from the Secretary of 

 the Washington Academy of Sciences relative to the movement 

 to erect a building for the scientific societies of Washington. 



Under the head of Exhibition of Specimens and Short Notes, 

 Mr. Ashmead showed a new genus of Mymosidae, a specimen of 

 which he had received from Turkestan from Professor Magretti, 

 of Italy, and which he proposes, with the permission of the Italian 

 entomologist, to call Magrettina. The following description of 

 the new genus was submitted by Mr. Ashmead : 



MAGRETTINA, A NEW GENUS IN THE FAMILY MYMOSIDvE. 

 By WILLIAM H. ASHMEAD. 



In an exchange of exotic Hymenoptera received recently from 

 the distinguished Italian hymenopterologist, Dr. Paolo Magretti, 

 of Milano, was a single specimen of a fossorial wasp labelled 

 Meria nocturna Morawitz, from Turkestan. 



It was a male, "and I was at once struck by its resemblance to 

 the males in the American genus Brac/iycistis Fox. A close 

 examination of the specimen soon convinced me that the species 

 was not a Meria, and that Morawitz was wrong in characterizing 

 it in this genus ; that it did not belong to either the families My- 

 zinidce or Scoliidce, Morawitz evidently having been deceived 

 by a superficial resemblance to some forms found in these fami 

 lies ; and that it in reality represented a new genus in the family 

 Mymosidce, closely allied to the genera Brachycistis Fox and 

 Milluta Andre. 



I propose, therefore, to make it the type of a new genus which 

 I shall call Magrettina, in honor of Dr. Magretti, and shall 

 here brieflv call attention to a few of its more salient characters, 

 which will readily distinguish it from Brachycistis and Milluta. 



It agrees with both of the above-mentioned genera in having a 

 large well-developed stigma, in having the abdomen terminat 

 ing in a sharp, upward curved aculeus, and in having a somewhat 

 similar habitus, but otherwise is quite distinct. The marginal 

 cell is long, not short, being nearly twice as long as the stigma, 

 the radius originating from near the apex of the stigma ; there 



