576 Annals of the South African Museum. 



J 

 A. silvicola, n. sp. 



$ . 3-4-3'8 mm. Head dark reddish -brown, thorax and petiole 

 piceous, abdomen black, tarsi brownish-yellow, fiagellum and scapes 

 brown, the basal two-thirds of the latter dark ochreous. Legs, petiole 

 and abdomen shining, the rest of the body dull. Pilosity yellowish, 

 long, exserted, fairly abundant all over including the legs and scapes, 

 present also on the edge of the scale, longest and most plentiful on the 

 head and abdomen. A scanty and decumbent pubescence on the man- 

 dibles, fiagellum and legs. Head, pronotum, epinotum and dorsum of 

 the meso-metanotum very finely and densely granulate, the sides of the 

 meso-metanotum sharply and longitudinally striate, the lower angles 

 and margin of the epinotum smooth and shining. Scale smooth. 

 Abdomen microscopically reticulate, finely punctured. Head, including 

 the closed mandibles, subcircular, a trifle longer than wide. Eyes very 



Fig. 57. — Acantholep/s silvicola, n. sp. 



large, placed just in front of the middle of the sides. Clypeus convex, 

 its anterior margin arcuate, sharply carinate in the middle over the 

 anterior two-thirds of its length. Mandibles G-dentate, finely and 

 closely striate. The scapes extend beyond the hind margin of the head 

 by a little less than half their length. Head one-third wider than the 

 pronotum. The latter is two-thirds wider than long, distinctly 

 flattened above, its sides very convex. The thorax is sti'ongly constricted 

 at the mesonotum, which is barely half as wide as the pronotum and 

 about as wide as long. Metanotum widened posteriorly, two-thirds as 

 long in the middle as the mesonotum, separated from the latter by a 

 wide and deep depression. Metanotal stigmata very prominent, sub- 

 conical when seen in profile. Meta-epinotal suture deep. The dorsum 

 of the epinotum rises abruptly and vertically from the suture, and is 

 thence continued backwards and inclined upwards towards the posterior 

 margin, which bears on each side a large and broad tubercle. Seen 

 from the side these tubercles appear as wide and upturned teeth. 

 Across the apices of the tubercles the dorsum of the epinotum is three 

 times as wide as it is long in the middle. The declivity is wide and 

 oblique, longer than the dorsum. In front of the tubercles the dorsum 



