76 Phoridae. 



is not between the side parts but goes through the dorsal part; this 

 condition, however, is, I think, of secondary nature, the side parts 

 being connected below the opening. The hypopygium is more or 

 less hairy in various ways, especially on the sides, and not rarely 

 it is here provided with bristles, arranged in certain ways, (The 

 hypopygium of the Phoridae has not yet been comparatively morpho- 

 logically studied ; no doubt important results will be gained by such a 

 study, as already proved by Schmitz's examination of the hypopy- 

 gium in Phora). In the female there is as in the male generally six 

 normal, not transformed segments with chitinous tergites, but 

 there are soma exceptions, thus in Dohrniphora the fifth and sixth 

 or only the sixth is membraneous, without chitinized tergites, and 

 in most species of Gymnophora some (the fourth, fourth and fifth 

 or third to fifth) segments are membraneous; the segments following 

 after the sixth are smaller and telescopically retractile, they may 

 all have chitinized dorsal and ventral piates, not rarely longitudinally 

 divided and generally small; the ninth and especially the tenth seg- 

 ment are small, the tenth bears a pair of small- end lamellæ, generally 

 directed downwards; these segments are otherwise not transformed, 

 but in some genera (as in Pseudacteon among Danish genera) the 

 last segments may form a chitinized, more or less long ovipositor. 

 In some single cases a tergal plate may be very reduced or wanting 

 in the female abdomen as the fifth in Chaetoneiirophora thoracica 

 (see under this species), and in the genus Phalacrotophora, and the 

 fourth in Aphiochaeta zonata, or a tergite may be curiously abbri- 

 viated as in some species of Aphiochaeta; in some other females of 

 Aphiochaeta some tergites may be narrowed so that the dorsal side 

 parts of abdomen is more or less membraneous, and sometimes, as 

 in A. ruficornis, the narrowing of the tergites is variable individually, 

 what are also the abbreviated tergites mentioned. All these features 

 show that the female abdomen in the Phoridae is somewhat inclined 

 towards a diminishing of the tergal piates, and this reaches its climax 

 in foreign forms with the tergites very small or abdomen quite mem- 

 braneous. In the Metopina female we met with a curious formation; 

 at the base of the fifth segment is an opening, covered by a movable, 

 semicircular chitinous plate; this feature is more often met with 

 among foreign genera as mentioned below. Abdomen is generally 

 sparingly or very sparingly and short haired above, sometimes almost 

 imperceptibly, the hairs along the hind margins of the segments 

 are as a rule slightly longer and these hairs increase as a rule a little 



