7 2 



H. STEMPFFER 



Head small ; eyes smooth ; palpi protruding beyond the frons, slightly ascendant, second 

 segment long, clothed below with white scales, third segment very short, blackish with a few 

 white scales ; antennae short, scarcely half the length of the costa, with a poorly differentiated 

 fusiform club ; thorax and abdomen robust, clothed below with white silky hair ; legs clothed 

 with yellow scales, tibiae shorter than the femora ; $ fore tarsus (Text-fig. 70) five-segmented 

 and bearing at the apex two strong claws. 



Wing venation (Text-fig. 255). 



Male genitalia (Text-fig. 71) : dorsum (i.e. uncus and tegumen) folded over like a hood, 

 the posterior edge rounded, with a shallow median depression, and a median rounded bulge 

 on the anterior edge ; no subcuni ; vinculum rather narrow, prolonged backwards to form a 

 large rounded saccus ; lower fultra composed of two small lobes attached near the base of the 

 valves, which are subtriangular with rounded apices ; penis long, strong, subcylindrical, with its 

 apex obliquely truncate ; vesica bearing numerous small cornuti ; uncus and apices of valves 

 bearing long, fine hairs. 



The genitalia somewhat resemble those of Aslauga vininga Hewitson, in the 

 reduced dorsal elements, the absence of subunci, the large rounded saccus and the 

 robust penis. This similarity, like the segmented fore tarsi of the male, shows that 

 the genus Egumbia belongs to the Liphyrinae and not, as Bethune Baker supposed, 

 to the Epitolinae. Karsch did not place ernesti in Epitola without some reserve. 



The holotype of Epitola ernesti Karsch is a female. In 1895 Karsch did not know 

 the male, which was only described in 1904 by Suffert (Dt. ent. Z. Iris 17 : 52). 

 The two sexes of this species are very dissimilar in appearance, the male being 

 silvery blue, the female almost pure white. When Bethune Baker received two 

 specimens from Egumbe, in Northern Nigeria, he believed them to be females, though 

 in fact they were males, as I have been able to ascertain by dissecting one of them. 

 As it did not occur to Bethune Baker that his specimens could be Karsch's Epitola 

 ernesti, he described them as catori and erected for them the new genus Egumbia at 

 the same time. There is no doubt whatever that catori is the male of Karsch's 

 ernesti. 



Fig. 71. Egumbia ernesti (Karsch), o* genitalia. 



