July, 1909.] 



145 



Fungivora. — Both sexes were met with in moderate numbers on the 

 old funo;us-infested beech tree in Stoke Wood during October, 1906, 

 and a few others have been picked up at one time or another by pro- 

 miscuous sweeping in the autumn. Whilst 

 quite distinct from heclceri, fungivora 

 comes much nearer rudis, especially to 

 that variety of it in which the costal 

 cilia are abnormally long. Setting aside, 

 however, other characters, the different 

 positions of certain bristles on the frons 

 Fio. 1. is amply sufficient to distinguish them. 



In riulis (Fig. 1) the inner bristle of the lower frontal row lies beneath 

 and a little to the inner side of the outer one, 

 and in consequence the upper pair of supra- 

 antennal bristles stand unusually wide apart, 

 whilst mfunqicola (Fig. 2) the position of the 

 bristles, both frontal and supra-antennal, is nor- 

 mal. Where, as in rudis, the deviation from the 

 normal is extreme, a character no doubt of 

 great importance is afforded by the bristles of fio. 2. 



the lower frontal row, but I believe little weight may be attached to 

 those slight and not infrequent differences which make the line of 

 bristles just a trifle straighter or a trifle more curved as the case may 

 be, since these small variations are rather individual than specific. 



Alhipennis. — This deep black insect, found commonly indoors as 

 well as out, is on the wing in the early part of the year, and again and 

 more abundantly in the autumn. It is one of the few species in which 

 there may be a doubt whether it should be placed in Section C or 

 Section D. The male costa is certainly short, but that of the female 

 nearly reaches the wing middle, and on this ground has its present 

 position been given it. Associated in the table with the species having 

 bristly pleurae and yellow halteres, it nevertheless seems to want that 

 general facies which is common to them, and its affinities are rather 

 with nigripes, from which it chiefly differs by its larger size, yellow 

 instead of black halteres, and by the presence of a pre-eminently long 

 and strong bristle on the mesopleurge. 



Sordida, Ztt. —First recorded as British by Mr. Malloch (Eat. 

 Mo. Mag., vol. xlii, p. 276). He found it among rotten fungi at 

 Bonhill, 23.9.06, taking two of each sex. I pick it up occasionally in 

 the autumn. The male is quite unmistakeable ; nothing approaching 



