NOTES 93 



The Stinging of Ophion. — Sir Herbert Maxwell's article on 

 the stinging of Ophioji Inteiis interested me, as when handling these 

 ichneumons I had been slightly stung on several occasions, but it 

 never raised a lump. In 1916, however, two specimens of an 

 Ophion, but I am not sure about the species, were sent to me in 

 a letter, with an account of their stinging power. The girl who 

 caught them was stung by one, and the sting raised "a small 

 white blister, but she felt no ill effects in the morning." Several 

 hymenopterists have told me that Ophion cannot sting ! The male, 

 which of course has nothing to sting with, will double round its 

 curved abdomen, and threaten to sting, much in the same way 

 that a dragon-fly will act, and deceive an ignorant captor. 



The unprovoked nocturnal attack is difficult to understand, 

 unless the sleeper unconsciously touched the insect; but it flies at 

 night and often enters bedrooms. Probably the diurnal biter, in 

 the garden, was Stomoxys and not an ichneumon. I have never 

 been bitten by Stomoxys at night, but too frequently in the 

 daytime. — T. A. Coward, Manchester Museum. 



Haliplus immaculatus, Gerhardt., a Water Beetle, in 

 the Forth Area.— During April 191 2 this Water Beetle occurred 

 in the canal near Polmont Station, which is situated in that part of 

 Stirlingshire falling within the Forth Area. This, I expect, is the 

 Stirlingshire record for the species referred to in Mr Balfour- 

 Browne's paper upon the British species of the genus Haliplus 

 allied to ruficollis, De G. {A?in. and Mag. of Nat. Hist, ser. 8, vol. 

 XV., p. 120), as I sent him specimens from the Polmont locality. 

 Haliphis fluviatilis, Aube, a species usually found in more swiftly 

 moving water, also occurred in the Canal in company with 

 immaculatus. — A. Fergusson, Glasgow, 



Ray's Wagtail in Ayrshire. — Ayrshire is not a county with 

 which I am very familiar, and I may be recording a well-known fact 

 in stating that I found this Wagtail common in the vicinity of 

 Gailes in 191 7. I first saw the bird early in April near the village 

 of Drybridge. By 20th May I had seen considerable numbers even 

 within the bounds of the camp, and I often heard their call while we 

 were on parade. On 2 ist May I saw a hen Wagtail with building 

 material in its beak near Monkton village, and on 22 nd May I saw 

 two pairs feeding young in a grass field near Drybridge. On 25th 

 May I found after some trouble a nest in a ploughed field under an 

 upturned sod over which the roller had passed without doing any 

 harm; there were two eggs. On 28th May Capt. F. Franklin 



