254 STAPHYLINIDA. 
GYROPH ANA. 
Gyrophena, Mannerheim, Brachél. p. 74 (1830); Mulsant et Rey, Hist. Nat. Col. Fr., Brévipennes, 
Aléochariens, Bolitoch. (1871), p. 17. 
About sixty species are included in this genus; they are distributed over Europe, 
Ceylon, Austro-Malasia, Japan, and North and South America, so that it is probable 
the genus will prove to be nearly cosmopolitan. All the species whose habits are 
known are in the perfect state exclusively dwellers in or among fungi; and at 
present, if we may judge from the number of Central and South American species, 
it would appear that the forests of tropical America are the headquarters of the 
genus. The species are best distinguished by the sexual armature of the terminal 
segments; and the study of the large series here described has disclosed the remarkable 
fact that in many species this armature is as peculiar, or nearly so, in the female 
as it is in the male sex: in certain cases where the male armature is very similar in the 
males of two species, it is very dissimilar in the females; in the European species the 
females are without external armature ; in one of the species here described the male © 
characters are subject to diminution or disappearance; so that we have in fact among 
these minute creatures all the complex peculiarities of sexual armature that exist 
among the large Lamellicorn Coleoptera, but in the latter on the anterior parts of the 
body. 
1. Gyrophena pumila. 
Gyrophena pumila, Sharp, Trans. Ent. Soc. Lond. 1876, p. 72°. 
Hab. GuateMaLta, San Juan in Vera Paz (Champion).—Sovtn America, Amazon 
valley 1. 
Mr. Champion has sent us but a single specimen of this most minute creature. It 
differs from the Amazonian individuals in that the antenne are clear pale yellow, but 
in no other respect so far as I can see. 
2. Gyrophena oblita. 
Minuta, brevis, latiuscula, subdepressa, sublevigata, nitida, fusco-nigra, antennis pedibusque dilute flavis ; 
prothorace fortiter transverso, fere impunctato; elytris quam hic paulo longioribus, parcius subtiliusque 
punctulatis. 
Long. 1} millim. 
Hab. Guatemaua, Zapote (Champion). 
Antenne clear yellow, rather short and stout; third and fourth joints very small, 
fifth to tenth transverse; terminal joint short. Head short and broad, narrowed behind the 
eyes, impunctate. ‘Thorax twice as broad as long, narrower than the elytra, almost 
impunctate, without trace of serially or quadrately disposed punctures. Elytra with 
fine and distant punctuation. Hind body impunctate. 
