79 
to nine days elapse from oviposition to the spinning of the 
cocoon. 
Methoca punctata Williams of the Philippines only partially 
paralyzes her prey, so that it again becomes rather active. The 
egg is laid longitudinally on the underside of the third thoracic 
segment. Incubation is longer than in M. striatella. 
PSAMMOCHARIDAE (POMPILIDAB). 
This is an extensive family consisting of small to very large 
wasps noted for their long legs and consequent great agility. The 
neck is short, and the thorax being usually higher than the head, 
gives these insects a rather hunchback appearance. The abdomen 
is without a noticeable pedicel or stem. A number of the species 
are grey-black or jet black, many have orange wings, while in 
others they may be iridescent violet black. They are probably 
the most active runners of all wasps, and inasmuch as the great 
majority of species prey on spiders, there is much need for swilft- 
ness. Bingham (1900-1901) has found Pompilus bracatus Bing- 
ham and Salius verticalis Smith which store their nests with 
cockroaches. Another species preys on crickets. 
The genera Macromeris, Paragenia, Pseudagenia and others 
are mason wasps, having advanced beyond the digging stage 
still adhered to by perhaps the majority of the family. ey 
build cells out of clay or other earth-like material; they may 
construct these in sheltered or unsheltered places above ground, 
more rarely in burrows.  Cell-groups may be the work of 
several females, which live in apparently semi-social harmony 
for months at a time. The method of building cells is here dis- 
tinctly different from that employed by the other mud-dauber 
wasps, as Sceliphron, Pison, Trypoxylon, etc., for where these 
latter spread on the mud with the mandibles, sometimes aided by 
the forelegs, pompilids use the end of the body for this purpose, 
bending the abdomen under the thorax in an ‘ungainly manner.* 
In these w asps the dorsal part of the last segment of the body 
(pygidium), which forms the mud-manipulating apparatus, is 
more or less devoid of hair. 
The genera Pompilus, Pepsis, Salius, Aporus, etc., are emi- 
nently diggers. Of these wasps Latter (1913) says, p. 7: “The 
enlarged and closely approximated coxae are of great value to the 
+ Froggatt in ‘‘Australian Insects,’’ p. 106, credits Salius (Priocnemis) bicolor 
with sometimes storing her burrow with Cicadas. In this he is evidently mistaken, 
for the insect which he figures (p. 105) for Salius is not a pompilid but probably 
Exeirus lateritius, a large wasp related to the Nyssonidae. 
* Howes (1917) noted one of these mud- daubing spider wasps in British Guiana 
thus using the end of her body as a trowel. The insect is wrongly identified 
there as a sphecid wasp. 
6 
