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resembles Bombus lapidarius, while the other with the yellow 
tail is like Bombus terrestris. In a note of mine which appeared 
in the “Entomologists Monthly Magazine” for April, 1890, I said 
there were no intermediate links between these two forms of 
bombylans, but in this I find I was mistaken, as Mr. Coryndon 
Matthews, of Ivy Bridge, Devon, wrote to me saying that he had 
in his collection a female exactly intermediate between the two, 
that is to say it has the tip of the abdomen clothed with bright 
orange hairs exactly as in the type, whilst the thorax is covered 
with tawny hairs as in the variety. I was then able to point 
out that in the type the resemblance is to the worker of 
Bombus lapidarius, and that the above intermediate variety must 
bear an equally strong resemblance to the male of the same 
species. 
I have here also another fly Chrysostoxum bicinctum, together 
with a solitary wasp of the Genus Odynerus, on which it is said 
to be parasitic, and you may notice how closely one resembles the 
other. Also a humble bee, Psithyrus vestalis, a species which 
collects no honey, but which is parasitic on the bee just above it, 
an insect of another Genus, Bombus virginalis, which does. 
Most of you must have noticed the common oil-beetle, which in 
early spring is seen crawling about under hedges, and which if 
handled exudes a drop, of what looks like yellow oil, from the 
joints of its legs. 
These oil beetles belong to the Genus Meloé, and we have 
seven species in this country. I have watched the female of 
Meloé proscarabeus (the species in the box) dig a hole in the 
ground and in it deposit a number of small yellow eggs. These 
eggs do not take very long to hatch, for when the buttercups are 
in bloom the young larve may be found in great numbers 
congregated among the stamens of the flower. Instead of 
describing this larva I have put one alongside of the mother 
beetle together with a photo-micrograph of the same. It is, as 
you will see, remarkably like a louse, and for this Kirby mistook 
Oe 
