17 THE SARCOPHAGINAE OP AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND. By G. H. Hardy, Queensland University, Brisbane. (Twenty Text-figures.) [Read 28th April, 1943.] With this paper a scheme is completed, whereby the Australian Sarcophaginae are classified on the characters of the terminalia. This taxonomic conception was initiated by some early authors, and, according to Professor W. S. Patton, the first to propose such a scheme was R. R. Parker (1914). Actually some groups were made on similarity of terminalia prior to his papers, and the idea grew naturally from an unspecified early date and was not the outcome of any particular paper. The first serious attempt to collect data for the purpose, using Australian species, was that of Hardy in 1927, but Johnston and Hardy had already seen some of these group values. Rohdendorf (1937) was the first author to complete the system for any one large region and he has given a good account of the Palaearctic fauna in this light. Other authors are Drs. D. C. Hall in North and Central America, H. Sousa Lopes in South America, Chi Ho in China, H. H. Salem in Egypt, and W. S. Pattor and C. J. Wainwright in England. There may be more authors, but their works are not available to me, and those mentioned have already covered ground sufficient to make it certain that the indigenous Australian fauna has its affinities almost entirely with the Palaearctic fauna. Treatment of terminalia. — Owing to the aedeagus being partly impregnated with brown and partly hyaline and even membraneous, it is advisable to study the terminalia in situ with reflected light under high magnifications of the microscope. For this purpose the parts are displayed by the normal method of spreading them. Very frequently authors advocate treatment in caustic potash, and it is mainly this treat-ment that is responsible for such wide discrepancies as are seen in drawings published. Parts are frequently broken down by the action of the caustic and even entirely lost to view. This defect was avoided by Hardy (1927), who cleared in turps-phenol, which removed all fatty matter without distorting the protruding parts that may be hyaline and tender. When so treated and mounted in Canada balsam, the structure and shape can be examined effectively under both transmitted and reflected light. The highly-translucent areas that may be projecting are readily traced by the edges that show quite clearly. Structure of the aedeagus. — Johnston and Hardy proposed some terms for the aedeagus, terms that are now found to be applicable in their entirety only to the Parasarcopliaga, a subgenus that forms a large part of the Australian and of the Palaearctic faunas. Some of these terms also apply to other sections, and all are needing better explanations. The aedeagus has two articulating primary segments. The basal segment has a pair of struts usually quite inconspicuous, that are the homologue of the struts on Calliphorinae where they form a conspicuous feature. The second segment, which becomes the dominant part, varies from a simple, rather small structure, to a large and complicated one. In the latter case there is an anterior part, simple or complicated, called the anterior appendage, and also a posterior part called the sheath. A depressed line at the rear of the sheath divides this into two, the apical part being the apical process. Usually the sheath, in transverse section, just below the depression, is seen to be horse-shoe shaped, the two ends of the shoe being the position of the lobes. The lobes and the apical process ai-e joined by an edge or arm of the horse-shoe on which D
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