100 STRATIOMYID.E 



pubescence behind the anterior femora slight and greyish white. Alar 

 squamae glassy whitish, with a rather darkened margin and with short 

 pale fringes. The abdominal markings of this specimen are entirely 

 distinct from those of any known Oxycera, and are in proportion more like 

 those of Odontomyia ornata ; perhaps some day the discovery of the larva 

 and the examination of immature imagines may lead to imj)ortant results. 



A male in Bigot's collection from Colorado labelled 0. Crotchi Osten 

 Sacken, has the antennte of almost identical structure ; it may be correctly 

 named but has only the basal joint of the antennte blackish, the other 

 joints being mainly reddish orange; it has no basal pair of abdominal spots 

 and the strong wing-veins are yellowish without any trace of reddish; it is 

 by no means allied to 0. tcnuicornis except in the structure of the antennre. 



0. tenuicornis is very local, and is apparently confined to the extreme 

 west of Europe and (according to Becker) to the Canary Isles. Macquart 

 first described it in 1834 from a female taken near Bordeaux, and Mr J. C. 

 Dale caught one female at Glanville's Wootton in Dorsetshire in 1842 ; 

 a few other specimens were taken near this last locality by Mr C. W. Dale 

 at various times, but it was not until 1897 that any other locality was 

 known. In 1897 and subsequently it has been taken in considerable 

 numbers in various localities in Herefordshire (Devereux Pool, Wool- 

 hope, and Shobdon Marsh) by Dr J. H. Wood and Colonel Yerbury ; 

 Mr C. Gr. Lamb has taken it at Milford in Hampshire; Colonel Yerbury 

 found it fairly common at Porthcawl in Glamorgan, and informed me that 

 some specimens were sitting on the leaves of Privet {Ligustmm), while 

 others were obtained by sweeping the nearly dry bed of a stream in the 

 sand-hills ; Mr C. J. Wainwright took three females at Shaldon in Devon- 

 shire, and it occurred sparingly in the marshy ground near the river 

 Deben in Suffolk on July 1, 1907. Dr J. H. Wood states that its habits 

 are similar to those of 0. analis. The dates range from June 18 to July 

 15, but I have mentioned above an extraordinary variety which was taken 

 on June 8, 1901, at Torquay in Devonshire by Mr C. J. Wainwright. 



Syyionymif. — Macquart's original description of his 0. tenuicornis in Suite a 

 Buffon, Dipteres, t. i., 251 (1834) is as follows : 



"5. O. tenuicorne. — Oxycera tenuicornis Nob." 



" Long. 2 lig. 9 . Semblable a VO. muscaria. Troisieme article des antennes 

 '■ plus grele et plus allonge que dans les autres especes; style court et peu distinct. 

 " Quatrieme segment de rabdomen un peu borde de jaune. Moitie posterieure des 

 '■ jambes noire ; posterieures noires." 



" De Bordeaux ; cabinet de M. Mahieu." 



Macquart's 0. rmiscaria was undoubtedly our 0. j^yf/fnci^a, as is proved by its 

 size (" Ij lig."), and his description of the antennae could apply to only this species. 

 By "quatrieme segment de I'abdomen un peu borde de jaune," which Loew con- 

 sidered "unbestimmt und unklar," lie obviously referred to the last abdominal 

 segment, and by " Moitie posterieure des jambes noire " he evidently meant that the 

 end half of the front tibire was black, Avhich is one of the strongest characters of this 

 species. Loew probably had seen only the original female specimen from which 

 Haliday had described the species, and consequently he could have had no idea of 

 the range of variation in the species. 



J. C. Dale's original description of 0. longicornis in Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., viii., 

 431 (1842) was obviously written by Haliday and is as follows : 



"Curtis's Guide, genus 1217, Oxycera." 

 0. longicornis. — " Nigra, macula lateral! verticis, orbita interna supra antennas 

 " repanda, thoracis vitta laterali, scutello et abdominis limbo flavis ; antennis capitis 

 " longitudine apice pariira attenuatis. ? . 



