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XXII. Notes o?i the Habits of Australian Hymenoptera. 

 By F. Smith, Esq. 



[Read May 5th, 1851.] 



On the Habits of Lestis Bombylans. 



(New Holland.) 



Mr. Ker, a gentleman who resided some years in Australia, 

 informed me that this insect is very common in all parts of the 

 country. He found it inhabiting the hollow stem of a Zamia. It 

 was at that time in a dormant state, it being the winter season. 

 The entrance to the tube was rounded like the mouth of a flute. 

 The stem of the Zamia or grass tree is straight and pithy, and 

 easily excavated. The cells, about a dozen in number, were 

 placed one above the other, separated by slight partitions. 



I will embrace this opportunity to correct an error which has 

 crept into all the works in which this genus is described or alluded 

 to. Fabricius, in his Entomologia Systematica, describes under the 

 genus Apis two bees from New Holland — Apis bombylans and 

 Apis muscaria — both in the cabinet of Sir Joseph Banks. St. 

 Fargeau, in the 10th vol. Encycl. Meth., and also in his later 

 work, the Histoire Naturelle des Insectes, has described the Apis 

 muscaria as the female of his genus Lestis, and A. bombylans as the 

 male. Now on examining the original specimens in the Banksian 

 Cabinet, I find the Apis muscaria is a male, of the genus Xylocopa ; 

 and A. bombylans a female, of the genus Lestis. St. Fargeau has also 

 committed another error by reversing the characteristics of the 

 sexes ; those given as the male belong to the female, and (vice 

 versa) both are however too general to aid much in discrimi- 

 nating the species. I will endeavour to remedy this insufficiency 

 by giving more tangible characters, and by describing a second 

 species of this genus. 



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