ROEBUCK : ON YORKSHIRE SIRIClDiE. 29- 



Abia sericea, L. Richmond (Cameron). In the old record 

 (circa 1835) before mentioned this is given for " Buttercrambe" 

 and " Nun Appleton Woods." Specimens from the York district 

 are under this name in Mr. Robert Cook's collection. 



Zarsea fasciata, L. New Miller Dam, near Wakefield 

 (F. Smith). Wakefield (Cameron). Taken near W^akefield in July 

 1852, by F. Smith (Zool. 1852, x. 3626). 



Hylotoma violacea. Lastingham, near Pickering (Cameron). 



Family SIRICIDAi. 



Of these very large and conspicuous wood-feeding insects I 

 am not aware of descriptions, or even of a recent enumeration of 

 the British species, so that the British collector is thrown upon 

 Thomson's ' Hymenoptera Scandinaviee,' and other foreign works 

 for the identification of his specimens. Of the three genera (&>(?.r, 

 Oiyssits, Xiphydrid) which Thomson includes in this family, 

 Stephens in 1S29 included 9 British species, Curtis in the same 

 year 7, while in 1840 Westwood estimated that there were 10. 

 There is some degree of doubt as to whether the species of the 

 genus Sirex are truly natives of Great Britain, or whether they were 

 not originally introduced (as numerous examples still undoubtedly 

 are) with the pine-trees on the wood of which they feed. The 

 various species of coniferous trees growing in Britain are I believe 

 not allowed by botanists to be truly indigenous, and the same 

 doubt rests upon the Siricidcs which feed upon them. Mr. Fred. 

 Smith writes me as follows, as the fruit of his long experience 

 in collecting Hymenoptera : " Sirex gigas — this insect was one of 

 great rarity before the country got intersected by railways ; the 

 wood used as sleepers is largely imported from NorAvay, &c., and 

 out of this most of the specimens come. The depot of the 

 imported wood used by the North-Western used to be up in the 

 Hampstead Road, and numbers of the Sirex are occasionally 

 picked up in Camden Town and in the neighbourhood." (Letter 

 dated 28th June, 1878). 



