182 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



habits are altogether different. If you compare specimens you will 

 notice many points of difference in structure. Merodon is a distinctly 

 smaller fly, with a noticeably smaller head ; the basal joint (femur) 

 of the hind leg is strongly swollen, and the middle joint (tibia) of the 

 same leg has a stout spine at the tip, which is very useful as a means 

 of identification. The differences in the veining of the wings are 

 no less marked, though perhaps less easily detected by an untrained 

 eye. The drone-fly is perfectly harmless ; its larvae (well known as 

 " rat-tailed maggots ") live in dirty ditches and similar places. — 

 E.E.A. 



A question then arose as to how and when the female fly laid its eggs, 

 and it was suggested that as she hovered over the beds she dropped them 

 on the foliage of the Daffodils, and that the grub, when hatched, followed 

 the tissue of the leaves down to the neck of the bulb, and then skirted 

 round and down it so as to enter at the base. It is known that Bombij- 

 lius, the larva? of which are parasitic in the nests of solitary bees, and 

 Cephenomyia, the grubs of which infest the nasal passages and throat of 

 deer, lay their eggs whilst hovering, and Mr. Williams thought he had 

 seen Merodon dropping them in like manner. 



In order to test practically whether the bulbs which showed only a 

 small black spot at the base were infected with Merodon or not, Mr. 

 Williams, in the autumn of 1901, sent a dozen such bulbs to me at 

 Shirley, and although I have had many hundreds of thousands of Daffodil 

 bulbs and not a few Merodon through my hands during the last fifteen 

 years, I am bound to confess that when I received these particular bulbs 

 from Mr. Williams I did not consider they had any Merodon about them ; 

 they showed only a small black spot on the base no bigger than a small 

 pin's head. They were potted and kept in a cold greenhouse and grew, 

 but very weakly, and when they were examined at this meeting on 

 March 25 eleven out of the twelve were found to have three-quarter 

 grown Merodon grubs in them. After the meeting I repotted them, 

 and in May and June the perfect insects appeared. The general appear- 

 ance of the fly, unscientifically described, is that of a small black humble- 

 bee, for which I think any one would mistake it when flying. It has, how- 

 ever, very often, but not always, some bright brown markings on the back 

 and tail, which shine like orange-brown velvet when the sunlight catches 

 it rightly on an insect at rest. But the greatest peculiarity of the fly is 

 the noise which it makes when flying about. I can only describe it as 

 something between a shriek and a whistle ; it is, of course, a small sound 

 in itself, but great in comparison with the size of its author, and you can 

 often hear it at a distance at which the fly itself is unperceived. The 

 common drone-fly (Eristalis) makes no noise when flying, at least so far 

 as my ear can appreciate, but the sound of Merodon betrays it to me 

 before my eye catches sight of it. 



The fly when it settles is very easily caught in an ordinary butterfly 

 net, but not so when on the wing. It hides amongst the leaves of the 

 Daffodils, rises on the least disturbance, but as a rule only goes a few 

 yards and then settles again, when the net can be easily thrown over it. 

 The most provoking part of it is the long time it covers ; e.g., I caught the 

 first specimen out of doors this year (1902) on May 17, and the last on 



