Mr. R. E. Turner on Fossor'ial Uymenoptera. 147 



Britisli Museum contains specimens from Bombay, South 

 India, Ceylon, and Java. Lefroy ('Indian Insect- Life,* 

 p. 351) states that this insect is common in India, the larva 

 living in the seeds, and the adult eating the leaves, of the 

 tamarind : he refers also to the description of the life- 

 history by Elditt (1860), who reared the beetle from pods 

 of Cassia. 



Spebmophagus, Schonherr. 



5. Spermophagus convolvuli (Thunberg). 



Loc. Aldabra, xi. 1908 (Fryer), sixteen specimens, seven of 

 which are stated to have been bred from fruits of Evolvulus 

 alsinoides, Linn. Pic's Catalogue (p. 59) records the species 

 from Ceylon, South Russia (introduced), and doubtfully 

 from South Africa. 



X. — Notes on Fossorial Hymenoptera. — XXVI. On the 

 Genus Homonotus, Dahlb. By Rowland E. Turner, 

 F.Z.S., F.E.S. 



Family Psammocharidae. 

 G-enus Homonotus, Dahlb. 



Homonottis, Dahlb. Hymen. Europ. i. p. 35 (1843) (nee p. 441, 1845). 



Wesmaelinius, Costa, Prosp. Imen. Ital. ii. p. 46 (1887). 



Hemisalius, Saussure, Graudidier, Hist. Madagascar, xx. p. 313 (1892). 



This genus is poor in species, but has a wide range in t!ie 

 Old World, though apparently absent from Americi. It 

 may be distinguished by the convex head, strongly hollowed 

 behind ; the clypeus prolonged and covering the mandihles; 

 the long and somewhat flattened median segment, emarginate 

 at the apex and with the apical angles produced into stout 

 spine-like processes ; by the bifid tarsal ungues ; and by the 

 cubitus of the hind wing originating beyond the transverse 

 median nervure. Second and third joints of the flagelluni 

 subequal, short. Tlie neuration of the fore wing in the 

 genus is variable, both in the proportion of the second and 

 third cubital cells and in the length of the submedian cell, 

 but the first recurrent nervure is received before the middle 

 of the second cubital cell. As in many genera of the family 

 there is a group of identical structure with only two cubital 

 cells, the second transverse cubital nervure being absent. 

 The species I have not seen are marked *, 



10* 



