12 CURIOSITIES OF ENTOMOLOGY. 



even the parasitic bees themselves do not always resemble 

 the bees whose nests they appropriate. For instance, the 

 species Eucera longicornis has a broad brownish body, without 

 any conspicuous mark, while its parasitic relative, Nomada 

 sex-fasciata, has the narrow body of a wasp, and, as its name 

 implies, six conspicuous yellow bands on the abdomen, which, 

 with the intermediate black spaces, make it a very distinct- 

 looking creature indeed. In some of the exotic bees more 

 especially, the distinct aspects of the harvesting bee and the 

 parasite are very striking ; they are, in fact, so much so, that 

 the insects might be thought to belong to entirely different 

 families. The beautiful Brazilian bee, Euglossa dimidiata, has 

 an attendant parasite as totally unlike it as it is possible to 

 conceive of insects of the same order. Euglossa dimidiata is 

 one of the most beautifully and variously coloured of the whole 

 bee tribe." The specimen from which our representation, 

 No. 3 in the coloured plate of " Bees and their Counterfeits," 

 facing the title-page, is taken, " was captured by Mr. Bates, 

 at Para, in the Brazils ; and it is found in other tropical parts 

 of South America. Latreille described this handsome species 

 in Schomberg's Fauna of British Guiana ; but it had been 

 previously described by Fabricius, from specimens taken at 

 Cayenne, and named by him Apis dimidiata; subsequent 

 divisions of the family having rendered another generic name 

 necessary, this beautiful species was attached to the genus 

 Euglossa. It forms its nest by boring tubular hollows in 

 large reeds, and there is a specimen of a reed in the British 

 Museum bored in this manner by this bee, or by a bee 

 belonging to a closely allied genus. Into such a tube the 

 parasite bee penetrates, for the purpose of depositing its egg 

 in the cells which have been furnished with honey or pollen 

 by Euglossa dimidiata. 



" In this case, in order to support the theory of Messrs. 

 Kirby and Spence, it would be more than usually necessary 

 that the intruder should be furnished with a very complete 

 disguise, as he must, in such a narrow tubular home, neces- 

 sarily come to very close quarters with the master of the 

 house. Yet, on the contrary, the whole aspect of the parasite 



