320 TABANID.E 



IV. TABANID^. 



Fio 210. — Tabaniis manilicomis $. x 3. 



Orthorrhaphous brachycerous eremochsetous flies of moderate to very 

 large (but never small) size, of bulky build, and more or less broad 

 flattened shape ; usually thinly pilose but never densely or furry haired ; 

 thoracal squamse large and rather upraised. 



Head large, transverse, somewhat flattened behind, and with the back of the 

 head flat or concave and fitting closely to the thorax. Frons at the vertex almost 

 flush with the eyes, and either with or without ocelli ; face with large side-cheeks 

 on which is a soft rather bushy pubescence. Proboscis projecting, sometimes very 

 much elongated (but not in any British species) ; palpi two-jointed, conspicuous 

 with the second joint elongated or thickened and difl:ering very much in the sexes, 

 being porrect in the male but pendulous and pointed in the female. Eyes large, 

 pubescent or bare, touching on the frons in the male but well separated in the 

 fenitile by a more or less wide frontal stripe, and usually in life brilliantly trans- 

 lucent green with purple bands or markings ; facets usually enlarged on the upper 

 or anterior part in the male. Antennae porrect, approximated at the base, nearly 

 always clearly three-jointed, but the third joint always annulated (three to eight 

 segments) though very rarely flagelliform, and the basal annulation of the third joint 

 large and frequently rising into a peculiar characteristic dorsal hump soon after the 

 base (fig. 214), while the other annulations usually form a sort of thick style. 



Thorax not very convex dorsally but rather flatly quadrate, strongly built, and 

 usually bearing inconspicuous erect tliin black pile intermixed with which is a fine 

 or scaly pale pubescence, but never with any trace of chcetotactic bristles ; meta- 

 pleura^ with a dense tuft of pubescence. Scutellum rather large, flattened, and 

 never with any marginal spines or tubercles or even bristly hairs ; metanotura 

 almost or (piite concealed under the scutellum. 



Abdomen broad and rather flat, moderately elongate or short, never slender or 

 constricted or compressed, composed of seven obvious segments, and without any 

 sign of bristles. Genitalia never prominent in either sex. 



Legs moderately stout, occasionally thin but never long, and without any trace 

 of bristles unless in the form of a minute serration on the underside of the front 

 femora ; middle tibite always and the hind tibiae sometimes (Pangonvnce) bearing 



