320 Mr. A. White's Description of a 



Latreille has entered at some length into its history, cor- 

 recting the mistake he had fallen into in a preceding me- 

 moir*. Ke is inclined to believe that the nest figured by Her- 

 nandez t under the name of " YzaxalasmitP' belongs to the 

 Lecheguana. If this be the case, "Chiguana'' or "Leche- 

 guana^' must be a name applied to different sorts of wasps J, 

 as Azara's Chiguana is said expressly to inhabit a hard nest, 

 having the surface covered with prominent inequalities. 



In Latreille's insect, the mesothorax is strongly truncated 

 at the end, and the scutellum is rather square and hoUow-ed 

 out behind, the upper portion of the base of the abdomen being 

 applied to it ; the pedicel of the abdomen is extremely short. 

 In the insect, specimens of w'hich I found on opening the 

 knob-covered nest I have described, the mesothorax and its 

 scutellum are gradually rounded off, and the first joint of the 

 abdomen is elongated into a pedicel. 



I am somewhat at a loss to which of the modern subgenera 

 to refer it, as it seems in some respects to differ from them 

 all. It would come nearest Saint Fargeau's genus Epipona, 

 which seems not the Epipone of Latreille's former works. 

 From Polybia of the same author it would appear to be not 

 distantly removed. I cannot find a description of it in any 

 work I have access to. 



Myrapetra^yHOY. gen. 

 Head transverse, wider than the thorax ; stemmata placed in an 

 equilateral triangle on vertex: antennce (in neuter) 12-jointed, 

 inserted in a depression of the face above the clypeus, rather 

 closer to the edge of the emarginate eyes than they are to each 

 other ; torulus deeply punctured. Mandibles rather long and 

 stout, with nearly parallel sides ; the outer margin with a few 

 hairs, beneath they are hollowed out, and viewed from above 

 seem to have several longitudinal striae ; at the end they are ob- 

 liquely truncated and furnished with four teeth : the inner, when 

 the mandible is viewed laterally, appears broad and truncated, 

 but when seen from beneath is small and rather sharp ; it is not 

 much removed from the other three, which are acuminate, and 



can find no diiference in them. He proposed in the above volume the name 

 Nectarina for Latreille's and Perty's insect, as Brachygastra is preoccupied 

 in Entomology ; but Nectarinia being already used in Ornithology, Mr. 

 Shuckard proposes in lieu of it Melissaia, the species being M. Lecheguana. 



* On South American Bees, pubhshed in Humboldt and Bonpland's 

 ' Rec. d'Observ. de Zoologie.' 



t Nov. Hist., etc., p. 333. Latreille quotes the other as being in all pro- 

 bability the Lecheguana's nest, but his doing so seems to arise from an in- 

 advertent misquotation. 



+ St. Hilaire speaks of two species being distinguished in the country, 

 one making white and the other reddish honey. 



§ A fancifid word compounded of the names of two, ancient cities, one 

 in Asia Minor, the other in Arabia. 



