422 Transactions South African Philosophical Society, [vol. xiii. 



margin runs a humeral slender white band followed by four sub- 

 transverse white patches, and there is a broader one on each side of 

 the apex ; pygidium with a wide white patch on each side ; the 

 whole under side is banded laterally with white, the central part of 

 the abdomen is narrowly black with a median series of white spots, 

 the femora are coated with white, and the inner part has a fine, 

 flavescent white pubescence. 



Feeds on flowering grasses. 



Length 15f-16 mm. ; width 8§-8f mm. 



Hab. Transvaal (Pietersburg, Zoutpansberg) ; Southern Ehodesia 

 (Victoria Falls, Manica, Salisbury) ; Natal (Frere). 



GNATHOCEEIDA, n. gen. 



This genus differs from Gnathocera in the shape of the sternal 

 process which projects very little beyond the coxae and is there 

 vertically truncate ; the body is very densely hairy on both the 

 upper and lower sides; the basal part of the prothorax is only 

 moderately arcuate above the scutellum which is shorter, broader 

 at the base and not furrowed in the centre ; the upper lobe of 

 maxillae is edentate, but the bristles are so stiff as to resemble 

 spines. 



Gnathoceea hirta, Burm., 

 Handb. d. Entomol., 1842, hi., p. 547. 



Dark green but occasionally rufescent green, clad on the upper 

 side with slightly flavescent, very long setulose hairs, which are 

 denser on the under side and legs ; clypeal part partly or completely 

 coated with white ; prothorax very closely punctate, and having a 

 somewhat narrow marginal lateral wnite band ; prothorax punctulate 

 except at the base ; elytra with the intervals between the suture 

 and costae very deeply punctate, along the outer margin is a 

 band of interrupted white macules somewhat variable in number, 

 one on each side of the apex, and two or four dorsal ones on each 

 side in the posterior part ; the number of these macules is very 

 variable, and I have seen examples from Johannesburg in which 

 there are, in addition to four well-defined ones, five or six small white 

 spots ; in this varietal form the scutellum has a large white patch, 

 and the prothorax from two to five minute white macules; pygidium 

 broadly maculated occasionally with white on each side ; lateral 

 part of the body broadly banded with white, also the femora ; central 

 part of abdomen with a median series of white spots. 



Feeds on the flowers of various plants. 



