20 
Anopheles maculipennis, Mg. 
The Spotted Gnat. 
Plate 4. 
Like the foregoing species, this is one of the mosquitoes chiefly 
concerned in the dissemination of malaria in Italy at the present day. 
It is widely distributed in Great Britain, and is very common in many 
places. In Ireland it was recorded by Haliday in 1827 (' Zool. 
Journal,' Vol. III. (1828), p. 501) as occurring "in profusion, in the 
neighbourhood of Belfast, throughout the summer and autumn." In 
England, according to Theobald {op. cit. p. 193), the time of appear- 
ance of this species is " from March to May, and again from June to 
December." The same writer adds that : — " The majority appear in 
July and August. Females only occur early in the year." He also 
states that specimens " may be found in the daytime settled inside 
outhouses and privies." British females of A. maculipennis would 
appear sometimes to be less blood-thirsty than those of either of the 
foregoing species, and Theobald's experience has been that both 
sexes subsist entirely on vegetable food. If this is the case it would 
suggest that a change must have taken place in the feeding-habits of 
British females of this species, since the time when ague (malaria) 
was prevalent in this country. Nevertheless there can be no doubt 
that on occasion females of A. maculipennis in the British Islands 
suck blood at the present time. Thus, in their paper on ' The Geo- 
graphical Distribution of Anopheles in Relation to the Former Dis- 
tribution of Ague in England,' published in January, 1901, it is stated 
by Nuttall, Cobbett, and Strangeways-Pigg (Joe. cit., -p. 10) on the basis 
of investigations made in the previous year : — " That the English 
Anopheles maculipennis is just as fond of blood as its continental con- 
freres has been amply proved by experiment during July and 
August." Again, a correspondent who wrote from Langport, Somerset, 
on August 16th, 1905, and forwarded for identification specimens of 
this species and Tlieobaldia annulata, Schrk. (Plate 5), complained 
that : — " Since residing in Langport, which is on the level of Sedge- 
