Prionopoda] BRITISH ICHNEUMONS. 275 

ocelli and a quadrate frontal mark concolorous or ferrugineous. Antennae 
filiform and slender, of ¢ a little longer than body and black with basal 
joints fulvous beneath, of @ length of body and mainly ferrugineous. 
Thorax gibbous and fulvous with pronotal and mesosternal marks black ; 
metathorax alutaceous and longitudinally bicarinate. Scutellum and 
postscutellum flavous. Abdomen a little longer than head and thorax 
and oblong; basal segment very smooth and gradually a little dilated 
apically, with its basal end or two thirds black; remaining segments ful- 
vous; terebra very short and black. Legs slender and fulvous with front 
coxae paler, hind tarsi and apices of their tibiae nigrescent. Wings sub- 
flavescent with stigma testaceous, radix and tegulae flavous; areolet 
irregularly triangular and subpetiolate. Length, 6—15 mm. 
It varies in sometimes having the thorax nearly entirely black or 
mainly testaceous with scutellum paler; and is liable to be confused with 
Mesoleptus testaceus till the pectinate claws be noted. 
On the Continent it occurs somewhat commonly in July and August 
upon umbelliferous flowers in France, Germany, Italy, throughout 
Scandinavia and has been bred in Prussia from larvae of Zenthredo repanda 
and of Aylofoma ustulata by Brischke, who describes its cocoon as 
cylindrical, diinnhautig and brown with a flavidous central fascia. It is 
certainly rare with us; Hope took a female about Netley, Stephens 
records it from Hertford in July and Bridgman from Mousehold near 
Norwich in the same month; I possess two females taken about Shere by 
Capron, a male at Chatham by de la Garde in June, 1892, and another, 
which flew in to light on the dinner table at Monks’ Soham at 9.0 p.m. 
on 25th August, 1907. Col. Nurse captured a female on 1st August, 1910, 
at Newmarket in Suffolk. 
2. xanthopsana, Grav. 
Mesoleptus xanthopsanus, Gr. I. E. ii. 59, 3 ?. Priopoda xanthopsana, 
Holmgr. Sv. Ak. Handl. 1854, p. 63, ?. Prionopoda xanthopsana, Holmer. lib. 
ett. 1855, p. 121; Voll. Pinac. pl. xxxi, fig.8; cf. Thoms. O. E. ix. 912, ¢ ¢. 
A black species with the mouth, face, frontal orbits and antennae api- 
cally flavidous, the abdomen centrally and most of legs red. Head 
anteriorly, with cheeks and frontal orbits, flavous. Antennae testaceous, 
of 2 basally above and of @ mainly above infuscate. Thorax with cal- 
losities at radix and sometimes prothorax partly testaceous ; metanotal 
areae obsolete. Abdomen black, apically stouter in 9; second segment 
of @ entirely pale red, of ¢ either nigrescent with the apex red or red 
with two black spots; third red and in ¢@ often apically infuscate ; 
terebra very shortly exserted. Legs fulvidous with the anterior basally 
paler; hind ones with coxae and sometimes their femora more or less 
black. Wings subhyaline, stigma infuscate, tegulae testaceous ; areolet 
irregularly triangular and subpetiolate. Length, 6—8 mm. 
It is said to occur in grassy places in June and August, and is recorded 
from Breslau, Silesia, Sweden and France. It is difficult to suppose 
Bridgman’s species to be synonymous with the present and, if Vollen- 
hoven’s lively figure be correctly named, they are very distinct. It is 
curious, however, that no one has noticed this species in Britain since it 
was first introduced by Marshall in 1870, I know not upon what authority, 
since it is not in his collection, 
S2 
