﻿66 Annals of the South African Museum,. 



never thicker than the first, endiug- ill a thin style. Proboscis short, 

 2 mm. long, red above with black tip, entirely black below or narrowly 

 red only at the base. Thorax and scutellum of a deep black colour, 

 clothed by an equal, rather short, dark fulvous pubescence, with long- 

 dark reddish bristles on the postalar calli and on the hind border ; 

 pleurae with more reddish hairs, reddish-dusted, almost bare below 

 and on breast; metapleural tuft dense, of reddish colour. Squamae 

 brownish, with short yellow fringe ; haltères yellow. Abdomen ovate, 

 deep black, but with dark-red sides and red genitalia ; it is rather 

 shining and has a bluish tinge on the middle of the tergites ; it is 

 clothed like the thorax with dark-reddish bristles at the hind border of 

 the segments ; venter red, with short hairs, pale at the base and 

 reddish at tip. Legs pale yellow, with long fulvous hairs on the 

 femora, well-developed fulvous spicules on the tibiae and 5 long 

 fulvous spines on the under-side of the hind femora ; claws red with 

 black tip ; pulvilli dirty-wdiitish, a little shorter than the claws. 

 Wings hyaline, with a small but distinct fulvous basal comb ; they 

 are yellowish-fuscous near the base and along the costal cell ; the 3 

 fuscous spots are as described by Macquart. Veins dark yellow, paler 

 near the base ; alula of great size, yellowish brown, with a pale fringe ; 

 upper branch of the cubital fork much retreating at the base ; discal 

 cross-vein set much before the middle of the discoidal cell. First 

 posterior cell a little narrowed at end ; discoidal cell long, with parallel 

 sides, almost rectangular, its apical vein being almost twice as long as 

 the discal cross-veiu ; anal cell broad in the middle and narrowed at 

 end. 



DiscHisTus coRAciNus, Loew (1863). 



An entirely deep black species of smaller size, at once distinguish- 

 able from all the other species here recorded on account of its entirely 

 black hairs. 



A male specimen from Pretoria, November 20th, 1916 (G. A. H. 

 Bedford). This and the following species belongs to the group of 

 D. minimus, a group which was believed to be very scarcely represented 

 in the South African fauna. The present species was originally 

 described from Bloemfontein. To the short diagnosis may be added : 

 Eyes touching on a line longer than the frontal triangle ; occiput not 

 prominent, with rather long black hairs at the border ; antennae 

 entirely black, with the first joint a little inflated and black-haired, 

 and with the third joint more than twice as long as the first, quite 

 linear, with a short style at end. Proboscis entirely black, 1;5 mm, 



