136 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. vol. 56. 



margin but lost in the area of transparent cilia at about two-thirds 

 of the distance across the disk. Legs, especially the middle and 

 hind pairs, long and for the most part slender, the front and hind 

 femora and the hind tibiae compressed and a little widened, the 

 middle tibiae slender, cylindrical, but rather abruptly enlarged at 

 the apex; front and hind tarsi slender, the joints of the front pair 

 nearl}^ equal, with the first joint but little longer than the following, 

 the first joint of the hind pair about twice as long as any of the 

 following joints, middle tarsi considerably thicker than the other 

 paire, the first joint nearly as long as the foUowmg joints combined, 

 and with a row of fine, short, close set spines on each side beneath, 

 the following joints gradually tapering so that the apical joint is no 

 thicker than the same joint of the front or hind tarsi; middle tibial 

 spur very long, and rather stout, about equal to the first tareal joint 

 in length; hind tibiae with but one small but distinct apical spur. 



Abdoinen about two-thirds as long as the thorax, depressed (if 

 not distorted as sometimes happens), as broad as long or even wider, 

 the sides nearly parallel as far as the tactile plates, and from that 

 point bluntly rounded or very obtusely angled to the apex; the first 

 tergite (not counting the propodeum) by far the longest or covering 

 nearly one-half of the dorsal surface, the following one or two seg- 

 ments often concealed by it; the tactile plates situated at about a 

 fifth of the distance from the apex to the base, the vibrissae unusually 

 short and inconspicuous ; on the venter the basal tergites nearly meet 

 at the meson, the apical ones diverging towards the apex, leaving 

 only the fifth ventrite plainly visible, the latter reaches to the apex 

 and encloses the ovipositor but is not at all compressed except in 

 distorted specimens that sim.ulate the posture assumed during the 

 process of oviposition; ovipositor in species of the flaminius group 

 concealed or nearly so but in species allied to vicinus and cocJcerelli 

 it is prominently protruded and slender. 



Sculpture of the dorsal surface of the head very finely punctulate, 

 the minute punctures being rounded and separated by slightly 

 elevated interstices ; face, frons, and to a less extent the vertex in all 

 but two species {vicinus and oculatus) with more or less distinct, 

 scattered, small, and shallow pin punctures ; upper part of the occiput 

 finely lineolate, either transversely or more or less rimosely or retic- 

 ulately so in some species; pronotum and mesoscutum very finely 

 scaly-reticulate with scattered setiferous punctures of great minute- 

 ness, the pleura with a similar but slightly coarser sculpture, the lines 

 on the greater part of the mesopleura being longitudinally arranged; 

 axillae and scutellum with a sculpture of the same type as that of the 

 frons, but somewhat coarser, the interstices between the punctures 

 more elevated, thus producing a much more opaque effect, and th 

 pin punctures always absent; metapostnotum transversely lineolate 



