384 GNATS OR MOSQUITOES — CHAPTER XIII 



abdomen is black, with white basal bands to the segments. Halteres 

 yellow, with dusky knobs. Length. — 4-8 mm. 

 Habitat. — Bonny, "West Africa, May. 



23. STEGOMYIA BREYIPALPIS, Sp. u. 



Plate xiv, fig. 17, Venation of wing, ? ; fig. 18, Wing of ^ ; fig. 19, 

 Costa of the same more highly magnified ; fig. 20, Head and appen- 

 dages of <? . 



Wing unspotted, black scaled ; those on the costa peculiarly 

 long and thorn-like, especially in the male, distal veins very long 

 and narrow. Tarsi unhanded black. Abdomen black, not notice- 

 ably banded. Palpi of ^ but two-thirds the length of the pro- 

 boscis, uniformly fuscous. 



This curious little mosquito is at once one of the smallest and blackest 

 of the family, and closely resembles a " sandfly," common in the same 

 locality. Sonae females show signs of lateral white abdominal spots, and 

 of an apical fringe to the segments, and there are wliite specks on the 

 pleurte and coxte in both sexes. The male presents several pecuharities, 

 the curvature of the nape consisting of a broad median area, clothed 

 with yellow upriglit forked and narrow curved scales, with lateral patches 

 of truncated white overlapping scales. The palpi are exceptionally 

 short, and much resemble those of a female Anopheles in form. The 

 antenniE on the other hand are well nigh as long as the proboscis. The 

 abdomen is very narrow in front, gradually widening to the sixth segment, 

 resembling in this respect C. annulatus, Schrank. In both sexes the 

 Acnter is rather pale cinereous. The fore and middle <? unguets are 

 unsymmetrical, with each claw provided with a minute basal accessory 

 tooth ; those of the hind legs are small, simple and symmetrical In the 

 $ , the apices of the femora are light coloured. Taken at Shahja- 

 hanpur, N.W.P., in October, in the house. The female bites during the 

 day. 



Germs XIII. ARMIGERES, Theobald. 



This genus may be distinguished from Stcgomyia by the third 

 long vein being continued inwards, beyond the transverse veins, 

 as an unsealed vein, to the base of the wing, a peculiarity which, 

 however, it shares with many species included witliin the limits 

 of other genera, and which may even be made out, to some 

 extent in some Ste<iomyue, so that personally I should have 

 preferred to have left the species within that genus, for the 

 present. 



Although larger than most of the species of that genus, they 

 much resemble the darker forms, such as S. brcvipalpis, and S. 



