Insects. 693 



St. Fargeau has described a species under the name of M. pyrina, 

 which he queries being synonymous with the maritima of Kirby. His 

 male agrees with lagopoda, but the description is probably drawn up 

 from a specimen in which the hairs have become grey from age ; the 

 apical joint of the antennae is compressed. Under these circumstances 

 I have not thought it prudent to change the name. 



Sp. 3. Megachile circumcincta. 

 Apis circumcincta^ Kirby's Mon. 



Female. — Length 6 lines. Black. Face clothed with dark brown 

 hair, thinly scattered on the vertex ; cheeks covered with a similar 

 pubescence. The thorax is clothed with pale fulvous hair, rather 

 darker above. All the tarsi are fulvous beneath. The abdomen has 

 the two basal segments clothed with a pale fulvous pubescence, the 

 remaining segments thinly covered with black hair, beneath densely 

 clothed with dark fulvous hair, becoming black towards the apex. 



Var. — The abdomen is sometimes entirely clothed above with 

 black hairs. 



Male. — Length 5 lines. The face is clothed with pale fulvous hair ; 

 the vertex with dark brown. The thorax above clothed with reddish 

 brown pubescence, the pubescence beneath is an ashy grey. The 

 anterior femora are fringed behind with reddish brown hairs, the in- 

 termediate and posterior pairs with a few long ashy hairs, their tarsi 

 have also a few long hairs of a similar colour ; the anterior legs have 

 the coxae armed with an obtuse tooth : the tarsi are nearly white, di- 

 lated, and fringed with pale hairs ; the first joint is long, broadest at 

 its apex, the second is small and somewhat heart-shaped, the two fol- 

 lowing minute, the claws rufous. The three basal segments of the 

 abdomen are clothed with a reddish brown pubescence above, the re- 

 mainder with black ; the sixth segment is emarginate, the ventral tri- 

 dentate. 



The male of this species closely resembles the same sex of Wil- 

 lughbiella, but the form of the anterior tarsus is different. 1 have 

 described that of circumcincta as exactly as I could, and it will be 

 seen that in Willughbiella the first joint is of an equal width with the 

 tibia, and that the joints gradually decrease in size, and have a dense 

 continuous fringe of hair, which is not the case in circumcincta, in 

 which species it is much thinner, and the hairs uneven in length, giv- 

 ing the fringe a ragged appearance. These distinctions will easily 

 separate the two males. As far as I have observed, this species al- 

 ways nidificates under ground, sometimes forming large colonies. It 



