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VI. On some new or little knoion Brii/sh ITymcnoptcra. 

 By P. Camekon. 



[Read March 5th, 1879.] 



TENTHREDINIDiE. 



Hylotoma Stephensi, Leach. 



I HAVE lately (tlianks to ]Mr. J. E. Fletcher, of Worcester) 

 had an opportunity of examining some specimens of both 

 sexes of the Hylotoma IStepliensi, Leach, a form Avhich 

 appears to be very little known. 



Stephens (111. vii. 19, 14) describes it thus: — Head and 

 thorax glossy violet-black ; abdomen yellow ; legs black, 

 with Avhitish pile, and the four hinder femora pale yellow ; 

 wings hyaline fuscescent, anterior with the costa to the 

 stigma, including this last, dusky. INIale with the an- 

 tennre rather long ; female with the pleurte yellow. 



I may supplement this description by adding that the 

 plcurfe in the $ are also sometimes yellow, and that the 

 sutures of the mesonotum and the posterior tibire and 

 tarsi are occasionally, for the greater part, of the same 

 colour ; while, on the other hand, there may be scarcely a 

 trace of this colour on the pleuras in the darker-coloured 

 specimens. The labrum and the two front legs may be 

 tinged Avith yellow, and the antenna3 may be fuscous or 

 light brown. 



Mr. F. Smith, in his " Nomenclature of British 

 Hymen optcra," sinks Stephensi as a variety of ])n{/nna, 

 Pz., Avhich differs from it in having tlie thorax and legs 

 uniformly bluish-black, and the wings (comparing the 

 specimens in my collection Avith Stephensi) are much 

 darker, and the labrum is black. Mr. Smith may be 

 correct in this, yet, if Stephensi may not be a good 

 species, it still must be regarded as a distinct variety ; a 

 variety, too, confined exclusively to Britain, for no con- 

 tinental author has described pagana as varying in 

 coloration.* 



* Eversman (Bull. Mosc. xx. 11) describes a ^ of pagana having all 

 the tibial and tarsi luteous ; Zaddach suggests that this is very possibly a 

 form of II.fuscq)ennis, II.-S., or, if not, a distinct species. 



TKANS. ENT. SOC. 1879. — PAKT I. (aI'II.) 



