252 
BRITISH BEES. 
Kirbii, Stephens. 
§§ With snbclavate antennae. 
18. Jacobea, Panzer, $ ? . 4-41 lines. (Plate X. 
fig. 1 S ? •) 
Jacobeae , Kirby. 
flavopicta, Kirby. 
19. Solidaginis, Panzer, $ $ . 3^-4 lines. (Plate X. 
fig. 2 S ? •) 
picta, Kirby. 
rufopicta, Kirby. 
20. Roberjeotiana, Panzer, $ $ . 3 lines. 
GENERAL OBSERVATIONS. 
This genus was named by Pabricius from the Nomades, 
a pastoral Scythian tribe, in allusion to the assumed 
wandering habits of the insects, and it is the fact indeed 
that they are usually found leisurely hovering about 
hedgerows, or the banks enclosing fields, or about the 
metropolis or nidus of any bee upon which they are 
parasitical. They are the gayest of all our bees, their 
colours being red or yellow intermixed with black, in 
bands or spots; they are also very elegant in form, 
which is after the t}^pe of that of the most normal An- 
drenidce, and to which they have a further affinity by 
the silence of their flight, and by their parasitism upon 
many of the species of that subfamily. From their 
very general resemblance to wasps in colour they are 
often mistaken for wasps, and are popularly called wasp- 
bees, although they have none of the virulence of that 
vindictive tribe, for although all the females are armed 
with stings, they are not prompt in their use, or if 
roused to defence the puncture is hut slight. In addi- 
