7. S ARGUS 177 



4 S. rufipes Wahlberg. Abdomen of the male mainly clothed with 

 brownish orange pubescence. Legs of the male black, with the knees 

 broadly and the base of the tarsi extensively orange; of the female 

 almost entirely orange, even the front femora being immaculate, 



A rather doubtful and unsatisfactory species. 



(^ . The following is the description of what I believe to be the male belonging to 

 the female subsec[uently described, but if «S'. rufipes has the legs, as described 

 by Wahlberg, "m utroque sexu totis rufo-testaceis," it may be only the 

 description of a variation of the male of S.flavipes. 



Eather larger than ordinary S. fiuvipes^ tnough some specimens of *S'. 

 flavi'pes may equal it. Frons bearing pale brownish yellow pubescence from 

 the vertex to near tJie upper ocelli. 



Thorax almost wholly pale haired, the short dense pubescence being all 

 pale brownish tawny except that in some lights some obscurely blackish 

 hairs may with difficulty be detected on the middle hind part of the disc, 

 while all the longer hairs are of the same colour as the short pubescence even 

 though in some lights a few of them may appear to be black ; the short dense 

 pubescence seems to be rather more sloping than in S.flavipes. Scutellum 

 with most of its pubescence brownish tawniy and with very few distinct 

 longer hairs, but certainly a few black hairs exist on the basal part of the disc. 



Abdomen rather paler green, and when viewed from in front with the 

 short rich brownish-orange pubescence much more extensively spread over 

 the sides of the disc than in S.flavipes, so that only the middle quarter of the 

 second and third segments remains indefinitely green, while on the fourth 

 segment the brownish-orange pubescence occupies quite each side third and 

 vaguely extends along the incisures so that only about the middle third 

 remains somewhat circularly green ; the fifth and sixth segments have all the 

 sidemarginal pubescence pale brownish yellow. 



Legs with the tiny pubescence on the tarsi black on only the blackened 

 part of the hind tarsi ; coxae blackish. 



Wings with a rather more definite cloud about the stigma than in 

 *S', flAjjvipies. 



$. Extremely like S.flavipes, but the front femora have no dark marking about 

 the middle. Pubescence shorter on the vertex (notably), frons, thorax, and 

 abdomen. 



Abdomen more deep purple, and the short whitish pubescence less con- 

 spicuous. Belly usually with a pale spot on the middle of the base of the 

 second segment. 



Legs less rufous, being almost pale orange ; front femora without any 

 trace of darkening about the middle ; tip of the anterior tarsi very slightly, 

 if at all, darkened. 



Wings more clouded than usual about the middle. 



Length about 8-5 to 10-5 mm. 



This species (if distinct) is very closely allied to S. flavipes, and it was 

 only the capture of four females in one day (July 27, 1897) which all 

 differed from S. flavipes by the immaculate front femora that attracted my 

 attention to it ; these four females were taken in the Forest of Dean on 

 July 27, 1897, and three days previously one very small female was 

 also caught there which confirmed their distinctness from S. flavipes. If I 

 have properly associated the male it has no doubt been always overlooked 

 as S. flavipes, but I was led to distinguish it first by noting it as a 

 remarkable variety of S.flavipes, and subsequently by suspecting that the 

 male of the Forest of Dean females would be vei-y similar to the male of 

 S.flavipes ; I then found that the peculiar male hadL been taken by Dr J. H. 

 Wood at Cusop Dingle, which is in Herefordshire, on September 7, 1898, 



M 



