106 



SYRPHID^. 



slightly hollowed below antennae, produced, distinctly snout-like 

 at upper mouth -edge, without any central bump ; autennal 3rd 

 joint elongate, rather porrect ; arista short, bare, dorsal. Tliorax 

 quadrate, robust, nearly bare, scutellum similar. Abdomen at 

 least twice as long as thorax, much narrowed at base about the 

 junction of 1st and 2nd segments, behind tliat club-shaped, arched, 

 tip narrowly rounded; 1st segment long, 2nd longer than 1st, 

 3rd longer than 1st but shorter than 4th, which is itself shorter 

 than 2nd ; a peculiar pointed projection from basal corners of 

 abdomen. Legs simple; hind femora much thickened, spinose 

 below, hind tibite slightly curved. Wings with apical sections of 

 4th and .5th veins very upright ; anterior cross-vein much before 

 middle of discal cell. 



Range. Europe, Canary Islands, Orient, North America. 



Life-history. Lundbeck thinks that the larvae probably live on 

 micro-organisms rather than aphids ; he figures them and a pupa 

 (Diptera Danica, v, p. 375 (1916)). 



83. Ascia brachystoma, Wied. 



Ascia /jmchysto)na, Wied., Auss. Zweifl. ii, p. 90, $ (1830). 



$. i/e'rtf? black, white-haired; antennae blackish-brown, reddish- 

 yellow below ; 1st and 2nd joints horizontal, 3rd drooping, oval, 

 tip rounded ; proboscis dirty yellow ; epistome hardly convex, 

 perpendicular ; upper mouth-border not produced. Thorax black, 

 with white pubescence. Abdomen club-shaped ; 2nd segment, 

 hind border of 3rd, and remainder yellowish-brown ; emarginations 

 of segments, sides of abdomen towards base, and tip of 4tli seg- 

 ment, with white hairs. Legs dirty yellow ; femora brown; hind 

 tibise towards tip blackish-brown. Wings quite clear, venation as 

 in the European A. j^odagrica. 



Length, about 4 to 5 mm. 



East India: in Berlin, Copenhagen and Wiedemann collections. 



Walker states that this species has been recorded from Hindu- 

 stan, but gives no actual data. Macquart, also without definite 

 data, quotes it as having occurred in " Indes Orientales," which 

 may mean tlie East India Islands. Wiedemann describes it from 

 " Ostindien," which, I believe, was with writers of that period a 

 general term for the whole of the Orient. 



Genus SPHEGINA, Meig. 



Spher/ina, Meigeu, Syst. Beschr. iii, p. 193 (1822). 

 S2}hoegina, Roiidani, Dipt. Ital. Prod, ii, p. 102 (1857). 



Genotype, Musca clunipes, Eallen (Europe) ; by original 

 designation. 



Head semicircular, rather wider than thorax ; eyes bare, dis- 

 tinctly separated in both sexes ; face deeply concave below 



