224 SOUTH AFEICA 
on the topi of the captor, and bottled before it pushed the attack 
home. 
Of the Aculeates the most striking were the Carpenter-bees, of 
which the commonest was Xylocopa divisa , found at Combretum, or 
other flowers, though one, a male, was noted as hovering persistently 
about a tree overhanging the river. The male of this bee is of a 
beautiful old-gold colour; of this sex only two were taken, but 
females, of the variety with the band on the back of the thorax 
white in place of old-gold, were commoner, and four or five 
specimens were secured. Of X. caffra, we took two specimens, both 
females of the variety mossambica , with a white ring in place of the 
usual two yellow rings. Of X. olivacea, we got but a single female. 
We met with three species of the very slender-waisted Wasps of the 
genus Ammophila, viz.: A. ludovica, Smith, a female, and A. 
beniniensis , Beauv., a male, both at wet mud, while a female 
of A. ferrugineipes, Lepel., was taken at flowers. Of the large and 
handsome black and yellow Sceliphron spirifex, Linn., we only 
secured a single female, also at flowers. Of the long-waisted grey 
wasp Belonogaster guerini, var. dubius, a single worker was taken at 
mud. We also took single examples of Salius ( Hemipepsis) vindex , 
Smith, a male; the Scoliid Myzine capitata, a male, and the small 
red wasp Odynevus carinulatus , Sauss., a female, the last-named at 
wet mud. The integuments of two males of Rhynchium rupeum , 
Sauss., proved of a truly rocky hardness. Bunning over damp mud 
three specimens of a notable Ant were taken, Paltothyreus tarsatus , 
Fabr., notable for its powerful bite, but still more for its evil odour, 
which is extremely strong and pungent, suggesting a mixture of 
formic acid and bisulphide of carbon. 1 Eunning along the branches 
of the tr ee-Ipomoea, near the Leaping Waters, were a number of 
another ant, Polyrachis schistacea, which we had seen at the Matopos 
on Sclerocarya caffra. 
The Coleoptera met with were not very numerous, but comprised 
Pogonobasis sp. (in the National Collection, but without a name), 
which was taken on the ground by Miss L. S. Gibbs; two specimens 
of Scymnus sp.; three Weevils, Bagous caenosus , Gyll., which Mr. 
G. A. K. Marshall had previously seen from Uitenhage, Cape Colony, 
only; Bhabdinocerus brachystegiae, Mrshll. (in litt .) and Xenorrhinus 
incultus , Faust, the first specimen of the latter that Mr. Marshall had 
1 For Dr. S. Schonland’s observations on the odour of this insect in Bechuana- 
land, see Proc. Ent. Soc., Lond ., 1904, p. xl. He speaks of it as “ a stench which 
comes near that awful stench of the well-known Caralluma luted (an Asclepiad plant) 
found in the same neighbourhood.” The plant, it appears, attracts flies. 
