72 HYMENOPTERA. 



time, the males and females had quitted most of the nests, so 

 that about the last week in June would usually be the best 

 time to look for those sexes. Mr. Rothney continues, " in 

 taking them, the workers swarmed all over me, face, neck, 

 arms and legs ; I got fearfully punished. The sexes were 

 also found in two other nests, but in about twenty others I 

 failed to find a single male or female." 



Mr. Rothney also obtained the males and females of 

 Formica aliena, the males in abundance, but only seven 

 females; this capture is the first that has been made in this 

 country of those sexes. This insect is regarded by Dr. 

 Nvlander as a variety of Formica nigraj and its differences 

 from that species are extremely slight; that which is most 

 readily observable is the absence of pubescence on the scape 

 of the antennae, and on the legs. In F. nigra the microscope 

 shows those parts to be sprinkled with long hairs ; the habit 

 of the insect is also diff"erent; it is usually found on exposed 

 bare patches on cliffs or commons, and it has a way of 

 tunnelling under the ground, and of casting up little hillocks, 

 after the manner of the mole; the worker has the thorax 

 usually of a pale testaceous colour ; the pubescence is not 

 to be found on the scape or legs of any of the sexes ; it is 

 not known whether any difference in the form of the sexual 

 organs would separate the males. 



In June I obtained all the sexes from a nest of Formica 

 congerens; I searched in the nest of this ant for the Tinea 

 ochraceella, but without success ; when I first discovered 

 the nest of this ant, a few years ago, I observed a number of 

 minute moths running among the ants, but it did not occur 

 to me at the time, that it might probably be a rarity. 



The following is a list of the rarer species of Hymenoptera 

 taken at Bournemouth by Mr. ^olXmey.—Mutilla Earopea 

 and ephip'piu'm ; Eumenes coarctata; Panurgus calcara- 



