( 53 ) 



Kolenati's description can only apj)!}' to one of the smaller species with a reduced 

 number of teeth in the last comb. This fact narrows down the selection to 

 two species, which differ in the male sex in one having a kind of a mane on the 

 thorax and the other being without it. Kolenati figures the male with a very 

 distinct mane, and this maned species therefore must be considered as the true 

 octactenus Kolenati (1856). The other species is simplex Roths. (1906). We have 

 so far been unable to distinguish with certainty the females of these two species. 

 Wagner, who found one of Kolenati's specimens, a female, in the St. Peterslmrg 

 Museum, believed this maneless female to be a different species from the maned 

 male in his possession, and described the male as a new species, jubata, which 

 name must now be regarded as a synonym of octactenus. 



There are several other species under the name of octactenus in the material 

 belonging to the Paris Museum which they received from Kolenati : one male 

 and two females of/, elongatus Curtis (1832), one male of obscura Waguer (1897), 

 and one male and two females of intermedhis Roths. (1898). The number of 

 different hosts which Kolenati records for his octactenus renders it probable that 

 he possessed all these four different species of eight-combed bat-fleas at the time 

 he drew up the description of octactenus, and that he examined one specimen 

 only when noting the number of teeth in the combs. In the description there 

 is nothing mentioned which would make it doubtful to which species the name 

 must be applied, and the figure, moreover, unquestionably represents the small 

 species with the mane on the thorax. The true host of this species is the 

 Pipistrelle {Pipistrellus pip/strellus), and the other hosts mentioned by Kolenati 

 should be discarded for the present. Two females of octactenus are still preserved 

 in the Berlin Museum in one of Kolenati's characteristic tubes and lalielled 

 Nannugo (the name of the host). There is also a third female in the same museum 

 from the collection of H. Loew, possibly one of Kolenati's examples, the host 

 being given as S. nannugo. In the British Museum there is a single female of this 

 species labelled octactenus in Kolenati's own handwriting, and formerly preserved 

 in one of his characteristic vials. 



It may be incidentally remarked that there are no eight-combed bat-fleas 

 originating from Kolenati in the Vienna Museum. 



When the present author first published some notes on the eight-combed 

 bat-fieas, he figured and described a female specimen under the name of octactenus. 

 This example is a female of the true octactenus Kolenati, in the sense in which the 

 name is used in the present paper ; but he also recorded as new to Britain Jubata 

 Wagner, believing at that time that the single female specimen referred to above 

 and the series of Jubata recorded as new to Britain were different, and not as they 

 really are — sexes of the same species. 



2. Ischnopsyllus hexactenus Kolen. (1856). 



Cfralopsi/Uus liexactemis Kolenati, I'nnisit. Cliirojil. p. 31. no. 2 (1856). 



" Hellroth mit sechs Riickenctenidien, am Pro-, Metanotnm uud den erstea 

 vier Riickensegmenten. Das Ctenidium des pronotums mit 28, des metanotnms 

 mit 26, des ersten Abdominalsegmcntes mit 18, des zweiten mit 24, des dritten 

 mit 14, des vierten mit 16 Zahueu. 



" Liinge : 0,002 Pariser Meter. 



" Aufenthalt: Im Balge von Syuofus barbustellus, Vespertilis muriuuo. 



