1919.] 67 



The eggs, which lie obliquely across the long axis of the ribbon, are, 

 when fresh, white with a faint yellow tinge. 



Mr. F, W. Edwards, to whom the mode of oviposition was un- 

 known, has kindly identified the species as Ceratofogon nitldus Macq., 

 and has drawn my attention to an interesting and somewhat analogous 

 procedure on the part of an American species, as described by 0. A. 

 Johannsen in the 58th Annual Report of the New York State Musemn, 

 1904, vol. V, p. 107 :— 



"Aquatic Nematocerous Diptera. — II. 

 " Sphaeromyas aryentatus Loew. 



" The et^g-laying of this species was first observed by Professor Needliam, 

 by whwm my attention was called to it. During the latter days of June and 

 the first of July about sundown, the female fly hovers about three or four 

 inches above the water's surface close to the shore in a place sheltered by the 

 shrubs and weeds. With the head pointing towards the shore and the body 

 swaying rhythmically laterally to and fro, the egg-laying begins. The eggs 

 are enclosed in a gelatinous ribbon, placed at right angles to the long axis. . . . 

 The ribbon when deposited is about 1*5 inches in length, flat, and appears 

 wrinkled like a paraffin ribbon. The lateral swaying of the body at the 

 bei?iuning of the egg-laying is of about one inch amplitude, but as the ribbon 

 of eggs increases the amplitude decreases, until just before deposition it is less 

 than 5 inch. When the egg-string is about \ inch long the flj' seizes it with 

 her hind and middle legs, the hind legs guiding, the middle legs paying out the 

 string as its length increases. The fore legs are folded up under the body. 

 This egg-laying process occupies from three to five minutes ; when completed 

 the fly suddenly darts down to the water's surface, deposits her eggs and 

 flies away. 



" The eggs when first laid are whitish, but later, as development pro- 

 gresses, they become brown. Each &'^^ is about O'-i mm. in length by '07 in 

 width ; somewhat pointed at one end and flattened at the other, the latter with 

 a minute rectangular bolster with knobbed corners." 



22 Southfield Road, Oxford. 

 February 13M, 1919. 



A revision of the species of Cathormiocerus Schonh. of tlie Iberian Peninsula 

 a7id Marooco ; by Manuel M. de la Escalera.—Th.\& " Revision " forma No. 38 

 of the Zoological Series of the "Trabajos del Museo Nacional de Ciencias 

 Naturales," Madrid, pp. 64 and 61 text-figures, and is dated Dec. 30th, 1918, 

 It is, of course, based upon the species inhabiting Spain, Portugal, and 

 Marocco, but some remarks are made upon the two forms recorded from the 

 southern or south-western coasts of Britain (examples of both of which have 

 been examined by the author), and a variety of one of them, from Brittany, is 

 noticed. Fifty-five species are enumerated — thirty-seven of which are re- 

 stricted to the Iberian Peninsula,— exclusive of eleven other described forms 



