276 F. ENOCK ON AQUATIC HYMENOPTERA. 



struggle to its feet, but it was evidently out of its element. 

 My magnifier revealed a hymenopteron, but not the one I bad 

 expected to find ; for after carefully transferring it to a pbial 

 of clear water it at once revealed its identity to my delighted 

 vision, and I realised that I was looking upon Prestivichia 

 aquatica. Operations were at once suspended so that I might 

 feast my eyes upon my prize, and also make a few sketches 

 upon the spot, noting down particulars as to attitude at rest 

 and in action. I watched it paddle itself about, with the aid 

 of its legs alone, the wings being kept closely lapped over its 

 abdomen. Going to work again for another hour, I dipped up 

 another specimen which was much smaller than the first, and 

 both being females. Another hour or more dipping and I 

 landed an insect whose identity I at once recognised from my 

 experience of last year, a very fine female Carapliractus cinctus. 



Having now almost exhausted the day, I packed up my 

 precious finds and wended my way to the far-off station. 



A few days after I paid another visit and found that some one 

 had completely cleared the pond of every bit of weed, and so 

 fouling the water that all my hopes of obtaining the unknown 

 male Prestwichia were ruined for some time to come. I kept 

 my first captures alive for some few days, during which time 

 they paddled about, minutely examining the weed with their 

 antenna?, evidently searching for a nidus wherein to oviposit. 



I mounted these specimens, which are now under my 

 microscope. Careful examination proves that the tarsi are 

 composed of three joints and nob four, as stated by Sir John 

 Lubbock. 



The ovipositor is of great length, from which fact I incline 

 to think that it is used for piercing through some considerable 

 thickness of material before reaching the egg in which it is 

 supposed to oviposit. 



This insect does not belong to the family Mymaridee, though 

 the Rev. T. A. Marshall has so placed it, in his list of British 

 Hymenoptera — the structure of the antenna? and wings exclude 

 it from that family. No doubt, when all details have been 

 worked out, the right relatives will be found 



Last year, when speaking of Polynema nutans, I expressed an 

 opinion that it would prove to be identical with Haliday's 

 Carapliractus cinctus, from the unique characteristic of the 



