!«"•] 151 



Oscinis trilineata, Mg. (anmdifern, Zett.). — I have caught this spocios at 

 Chipijeuhain Fen (Caiubs.) and Barton Mills (Suffolk) in the early spring-, and 

 Col. Yerbury has taken it at Fordingbridge (Hants) in May. It has a dark grey 

 thorax with three (or really five) bro^vn strijjos, the frons might almost be 

 described as having two brown stripes, and the scutellum is bro-wn at each side, 

 the shining blackish abdomen is broad and flat, and has gi-eyish spots at the 

 hind corners of eacli segment, the wings are rather short and the veins strongly 

 marked. The hind tibiae bear a minute black spiir at the tip. It was in the List 

 of Reputed British species as Siphonella trilineata 



Oscinis (Notonaulax) cincta, Mg. — This species has tliree impressed lines on 

 the thorax, and resembles the next species, but is larger and darker, and all the 

 bristles are usually black, though the pubescence appears pale in most lights. 

 The sexes differ in the coloiu- of the legs, which are entirely pale in the female, 

 but in the male the femora are dark except at the tip, and the four posterior 

 tibiae, more especially the hind pair, are darkened about their middle. I possess 

 it from several localities in Suffolk and Essex, and have seen specimens from 

 Cornwall and Scotland. Zetterstedt's 0. sulcella is the male of this species. The 

 genus Notonaulax has been suggested by Becker for those species of Oscinis with 

 impressed lines upon the thorax, bvit there seems to me to be every gradation 

 from deeply impressed lines as in cincta and lineella to merely indications of 

 lines, owing to a slight increase in the punctuation, which indications are some- 

 times accentuated by thoracic stripes of a darker colour as in trilineata. 



*Oscinis (Notonaulax) lineella, Fin. — Like the last species but smaller and 

 paler; thorax yellowish- grey, with all bristles of a yellowish colour; legs pale, 

 with a slightly darkened band on the four posterior femora and tibiae, the hind 

 tibiae appearing to have two narrow dark bands ; abdomen, pale at base and with 

 pale incisures ; belly, pale. It is not at all uncommon at Newmarket (Suffolk) 

 in September, and occvxrs on windows. 



Dicrseus raptus, Hal. (obscurus, Lw.). — The genvis Dicrieus, as redefined by 

 Becker, includes those species of Oscinis with a very long radial (second 

 longitudinal) vein, making the second costal segment three to four times the 

 length of the third, and a head deeper than long, with wide jowls and somewhat 

 retreating face ; the male abdomen is somewhat more tubular than in Oscinis. 

 The above species is the Oscinis rapta of the List, and may be known by the 

 absence of the postical crossvein ; the costa barely reaches the discal vein, the 

 femora and hind tibiae are darkened, and the pleuras are shining black or dark 

 brown. 



*Dicrxus vagans, Mg. — I have always considered that a species I find not 

 uncommonly in Cambridgeshire and Suffolk in Jtine was Meigen's 0. vagans. 

 Its chief characters lie in the pale legs and extensively pale pleura; whicli are 

 shining about the middle ; the abdomen and the male hypopygium is also more 

 or less pale. I have seen a specimen with the postical crossvein missing, as in 

 raptus, but the jowls are deeper than in that species. Continental specimens of 

 rufiventris that I have examined have thejjleurae entirely dull and are altogether 

 darker, except for the abdomen. I cannot, therefore, agi'ee with Becker in con- 

 sidering vagans a synonym of that species. 0. xanthopyga, Strobl, is, however, 



probably a synonym. 



X 3 



