THE MUSCIDiE. 627 



it undergoes all its transformations within the body of tb^; 

 living bee, and tlien forces its way into the world between 

 the segments of the insect in which it had lived. Latreille 

 reared four of these curious flies from humble-bees which he 

 had placed in a box. 



There are several species of Conops, all prettily coloured. 

 There is, for example, Conops Jlavipes, a smaller and slighter 

 insect than the preceding species, velvet-black in colour, banded 

 with bright golden yellow. Then there is Conops rufipes, 

 which is coloured exactly like the hornet, the thorax being 

 reddish-brown and the abdomen yellow, banded with dark brown. 

 Another species, Conops macrocephalus, is shown on Woodcut 

 LXXIII. Fig. 2, and the curious abdomen of the male insect is 

 drawn at Fig. c. The specific name niaorocephalus signifies 

 long-headed, and is given to the insect in consequence of the 

 shape of the head, which is wider than the thorax. 



This is a pretty and not common insect. The general colour 

 is black, and there is a coating of short ashen hairs. The face 

 is yellow, the antennae rust-red, and upon the shoulder of the 

 thorax there is a spot of silvery white. The wings are yellowish, 

 darkening into brown on the costal margin. The abdomen is 

 black, the margin of each segment is yellow, with a silvery 

 gloss. The legs are reddish, and the base of the thighs dark 

 brown. The insect may be found upon flowers. 



The generic name Conops is clearly a wrong one, and 

 calculated to mislead anyone who is something of a classical 

 scholar and little of an entomologist. The w^ord is Greek, 

 signifying a gnat, and has been incorporated in our lan- 

 guage in the well-known word ' canopy,' i.e., a gnat-curtain, 

 that being the real meaning of the word. Herodotus employs 

 the word Conops wiien describing the gnats or mosquitos which 

 infest the marshy lands on the banks of the Nile, and the 

 method employed by tlie fishermen in guarding themselves 

 from the attacks of these troublesome insects. 



We now come to the enormous family of the IMuscidse, a 

 family which may rank with the ichneumon-flies, the Noctuoe 

 and Tineas Moths, and the Rove-beetles, as tests of an entomo- 

 logist's temper and patience. It is hardly possible to imagine 

 anything more trying to the entomologist than to have half a 



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