THE BIG-HEADED MUTILLA. 



419 



with black and scarlet. In the male the head and a large patch 

 upon the thorax are scarlet. The abdomen is black, but is 

 adorned with a number of scarlet rings, of exactly the same hue 

 as that upon the thorax. The wings are brown. The wingless 

 female is also black and scarlet, though the colours are dif- 

 ferently arranged. In this sex the whole of the insect is scarlet 

 except a single chevron-shaped bar of black across the middle of 

 the abdomen. Seeing that the difference in colour is so great, 

 it is really no wonder that the two sexes may have been thought 

 to belong to separate species. 



Fio. 210. — Mutilla occidentalis. 

 (Scarlet and black.) 



There are several hundred species of Mutilla in the British 

 Museum, many of which have not as yet been described. 

 Among those that have received names I will briefly mention 

 three. First is Mutilla Klugii, of Mexico, a very strange look- 

 ing insect. Its head and thorax are black and covered with 

 short hairs, while its abdomen is thickly covered with very long 

 yellow hairs, so long and so thick that they make the insect 

 look like a yellow brush with a black handle. 



Mutilla ccphalotcs, i.e. the Big-headed Mutilla, is very rightly 

 named. It has a head of enormous size in proportion to the 

 body, and looking exactly as if it had been covered with black 

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