44:6 Mr. G. Meade- WiilJo on 



a considerable difference of opinion about the time when 

 Henri de Saussure was working at his invaluable ' Etudes 

 sur les Vespides/ At a meeting of the Entomological 

 Society of France (January 26th, 1853), M, E. Blanchard 

 exhibited the male Masaris vespiformis which had served as 

 the actual type of Fabricius^ and was preserved iu the 

 Paris Museum (Bull. Soc. Ent. Fr. p. vi, 1853). 



This specimen was collected in Barbary by the botanist 

 Desfontaines. Grave doubts as to the correct identification 

 of Masaris existed among those who had not been able 

 to examine the Fabrician type, and for this reason 

 M. Blanchard asked the Society to appoint three of its 

 members to inquire into the matter. Messieurs Goureau, 

 L. Fairmaire, and Guerin-jNIeneville were appointed for this 

 purpose. At a later meeting M. Leon Fairmaire made it 

 the subject of a special report, which was afterwards 

 criticised by Saussure. 



Dr. Schaura, who held different views on Masaris as 

 understood by Fabricius, Latreille, and Blanchard, wrote 

 fully on the subject (Ann. Soc. Ent. Fr. (3) i. p. 653, pi. 20. 

 fig. 1, J ? , 1853). There can be no doubt that the insect 

 figured by Schaum as M. vespiformis, F., is not the typical 

 form described by Fabricius from Barbary, but a new sub- 

 species from Egypt, which it is intended to describe below. 

 Observations on the fine series of 31. vespiformis from 

 Morocco, collected by Escalera and now in the British 

 Museum (Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. (8) vii. p. 113, 1911), laid 

 the foundation to an enquiry, and it was seen that whereas the 

 two tubercles on abdominal sternites 2 and 3 were markedly 

 different in both shape and heiglit in the Moorish males, the 

 males from Egypt possessed tubercles differing only in a 

 slight disparity in height and shape of apex. 



The Vicomte R. du Buysson was kind enough to compare 

 one of the Moorish males with the Fabrician type in Paris. 

 In his opinion the characters which differentiate the two 

 insects could not be considered more than racial or varietal. 

 Du Bu3 sson says : — '' Le type male dc Fabricius est parfaite- 

 ment conforme a la planche de Touvrage de Saussure (Et. 

 Fam. Vtsp. iii. pi. v. fig. 4), c'est a dire que le 2e sternite 

 abdominal porte une sorte de tubercule car^ne, tronque 

 obliquement dans le sens antero-posterieur, tandis que le 

 troisieme sternite porte une protuberance semblable h 



Fexemplaire du Maroc, que vous m'envoyez, Le 



type de Fabricius est ei\ outre jaune pale dans ses ornemeiits 

 clairs ; ces ornements sur celui du Maroc sent beaucoup plus 

 blanchatres. Avec la forme du tubercule du 2® sternite, je 



