ASILIS. 
343 
Genus VIII. — Afilis. 
This tribe is much more (lender in the body than the 
preceding ; many of them are fuperior in length ; and 
they all glow with the moll brilliant tints of green, 
purple, yellow, and brown. The generic charafters are, 
a horny roftrum, porrefted, ftrait, and bivalved f . 
Thefe animals are generally found in fwampy meadow 
ground, where, like the preceding tribe, they prove very 
troublefome to cattle. They are provided with a fling, 
■which inflicts a very painful wound, if you incautioufly 
endeavour to lay hold of them. The probofcis, though 
(harp enough to perforate the thickeft fldn, is neverthe- 
lefs perforated, and fupplies the place of a pump, in fuck- 
ing out the blood of animals. 
Inufca cralroniformii J, the ferruginous afilis. The 
thorax is gibbous ; the abdomen oval, {lender, and ta- 
pering § ; the three firft fegments of the abdomen are 
black, the reft yellow ; the feet and wings are of an iron 
colour. The graziers imagine, and perhaps with juftice, 
that of all the infeft tribe, this is the moft noxious to 
black cattle ; the very noife of their wings fets them a- 
running ; and before they flop, they generally make their 
efcape into a river, if any is near 
■J. Syft. Nat. p. IOc6. { Vide Mouffet, p. 4'6V 
§ Aftcs d’Upfal, 1736, p. 1 HofFnagel, t. 16 . 
