180 Mr. G. C. Champion on the 



has a metallic or infuscate abdomen, with the sixth segment 

 only red in <$ . M. subapicalis, Pic, type from Tabora, is 

 said to have the fourth and fifth ventral segments red and 

 the sixth black, characters peculiar to the female of M. 

 nigripes. The range of the present species is roughly from 

 the Great Lakes westward to near the mouth of the Congo. 



25. Melyris lemairei. 



Zygia lemairei, Pic, Aim. Soc. Ent. Belg. lii. p. 311 (1908). 



Elongate, robust, convex, moderately shining, metallic blue 

 or green, the head and prothorax sometimes brassy in the 

 green specimens ; legs and antennae black, joints 1-3 of the 

 latter (except 1 above) rufo-testaceous ; abdomen with from 

 1-3 of the terminal segments wholly or in part rufous in $ , 

 the reddish coloration less extended or sometimes altogether 

 wanting in ? , 6 always black in latter sex; somewhat 

 thickly clothed with erect black hairs, the abdomen fringed 

 with long black hairs at the tip, the legs also closely nigro- 

 pilose ; the head and prothorax densely puuctulate and 

 reticulate. Head short, rather broad ; antennas short. 

 Prothorax transverse, convex, gibbous in well-developed 

 specimens, arcuately narrowing from the obtuse hind angles, 

 feebly canaliculate, the lateral carina angulate, the margins 

 sharply crenulate. Elytra a little wider than the prothorax, 

 subparallel ; sharply tricostate, the interspaces closely, 

 irregularly angulato- plicate, and with 3—5 rows of fine 

 punctures traceable between the rugae, the inferior margin 

 crenulate throughout. Beneath closely puuctulate. Legs 

 rather stout, roughly punctured. 



$ . Ventral segment 5 with a deep transverse arcuate ex- 

 cavation, subtruncate at apex, 6 hollowed down the middle 

 and transversely so on each side posteriorly, triangularly 

 emarginate at tip ; median lobe of aedeagus much as in 

 M. nigripes. 



Length 8-10^, breadth 3|-4 mm. (<??.) 

 Hub. Central and E. Africa, Tanganyika and Mayambe 

 {types of Pic), Fwambo, Lake Tanganyika (A. Carson : $ ? ), 

 Karnbove, Katanga, alt. 4000-5000 ft. (S. A. Neave : iii. 

 1907 : ? ), Mwengwa in N. Rhodesia (H. C. Dollman : ii.-v. 

 1914: S ? )> Kamfua (£. Neave, in Mas. Congo Beige), 

 Elizabethville in the Congo region (Mus. Congo Beige: <$ ? ). 

 This is a broad robust form of the variable M. nigripes, 

 with closer and more irregular plication on the elytral inter- 

 spaces, and the prothorax usually more convex, sometimes 

 gibbous. One of the types ( ? ) from Tanganyika has been 



