52 ORANGE FLY. 



filaments, knobbed or dilated at the extremity, which are 

 placed on the head between the eyes, and which are a 

 characteristic of the male of this fly. 



Prof. Westwood, in his paper on this " Orange Fly," 

 in the No. of the ' Gardener's Chronicle ' for Sept. 9, 

 1848, thus describes the fly : 



" The perfect insect is one of the most beautiful of the 

 order to which it belongs, its general colour being fulvous 

 buff, with the thorax grey spotted with black ; the scu- 

 tellum black, with an undulated white line at the base, 

 and two pale grey bars across the abdomen ; the basal 

 half of the wing is much variegated with minute black 

 dots and streaks, with a buff and ashy cloud near the 

 base, another across the middle, another along the 

 extremity of the fore margin dotted with black, and an 

 ashy bar on the inner margin. The male is singularly 

 distinguished by having two slender filaments arising 

 between the eyes, knobbed at the tips (as represented in 

 the figure), a peculiarity which we believe is possessed 

 by no other dipterous insect, and which is wanting in 

 the female." 



In the specimen sent me this peculiar growth might 

 be exactly described, in the words of Macquart, as a, 

 filament terminated by a rhomboidal plate.* 



With regard to the maggot of this fly Prof. Westwood 

 writes, in the paper quoted above : 



" The larva is a white fleshy grub, destitute of legs,. 

 very similar to that of the celery-stem fly, and, like it, 

 it possesses two small black contiguous hooks at the: 

 front of the body, which it alternately protrudes and 

 retracts, thereby tearing the delicate membrane in which 

 the drops of juice are contained. The body is gradually 

 attenuated in front, very indistinctly articulated ; the 

 anterior segments, including the head, are retractile. 

 There are generally several of these larvae in each 

 orange, and when removed and placed upon a flat surface 



* PetalopJiora capitata. Trypeta capitata, ' Wied. Auss. Zweif.' No. 3., 

 1 Histoire JSaturelle des Dipt^res,' par M. Macquart, vol. ii. p. 454. 



