African and Asiatic Species of Melyris. 199 



A <$ in the Oxford Museum, received from Deyrolle under 

 the name M. rubrocincta^ Fairm., and 1\vo immature examples 

 of the same sex from Obock * (Dr. Martin), seem to be refer- 

 able to M. discoidalis. They are testaceous in colour, with 

 the head and two patches on the disc of the prothorax black, 

 the elytra with a fuseo-cseruleous stripe or space on the 

 disc (leaving the outer margins and sutural regions testa- 

 ceous) ; the puncturing of the interspaces sparser, coarser, 

 and more regularly arranged than in M. rubrocincta. The 

 metasternum is testaceous in the Obock specimens and 

 infuscate in the other one. The tarsal claws are very long, 

 toothed at the middle. 



52. Melyris limbifera. 



Melyris Umhifeva, Ancev, Le Naturaliste, iv. No. 8, p. G2 (April 15tb, 



1882) K 

 ! J Zygia rubrolimbata and var. rollei, Pic, L'Echange, xxv. p. 142 (1909) 3 . 



J . Ventral segment 5 feebly emarginate, G deeply bi- 

 impressed and triangularly emarginate. 



2 . Ventral segment G and terminal dorsal segment black, 

 the former cleft. 



Hah. E. Africa, Somaliland ' 2 (E. Lort Phillips and Miss 

 Gillett, in Mus. Brit.). 



There are a dozen examples of this species in the British 

 Museum, received in ]895 and 1898. It is recognizable by 

 the expanded, sharply upturned, testaceous or rufo-testaceous 

 margins of the prothorax and elytra, the reddish colour of 

 the prothorax so extended as to leave only a large black 

 patch or two oblong marks on the disc, the rest of the elytra 

 being metallic blue. The legs (except the tarsi, wholly or 

 in part) aud abdomen are testaceous, and the metasternum 

 more or less infuscate. The tarsal claws are very long, 

 toothed at the middle, and the fourth antennal joint is 

 triangular. Pic, in his description of Z. rubrolimbata' 1 , says 

 nothing about the similarly coloured M. limbifera, Ancey, 

 from the same region, the type of which should be in his 

 own collection (cf. Le Nat. 1898, p. 273). M.marginicollis, 

 Ancey (? = col/aris, Fairm.), also from Somaliland, not 

 represented in the collections before me, is an allied form 

 with the elytra wholly blue. 



* 31. {Zygia) notaticollis, Pic (190o), from Obock, is a different species 

 coloured like M. (Zygia) oblonga, F. 



