DROMANTHUS.—PRISTOSCELIS. 123 
4. Dromanthus jucundus. (Tab. VII. fig. 6.) 
Niger, prothorace femoribusque rufis ; elytris lete cyaneis, maculis duabus (una subbasalari prope suturam, 
altera transversa mediana) apiceque late pallide testaceis; antennis serratis, articulis quinque apicalibus 
pallidis. Long. 44 millim. 
Hab. Panama, Bugaba (Champion). 
Head, mouth, and palpi black. Antenne with five or six joints at the base fuscous 
above, pale beneath, the apical five quite pale. Thorax transverse, shining, yellow, 
elliptical above. Elytra wider at the base than the thorax, and expanding to nearly 
twice its width near the apex, shining steel-blue, with a spot on each near the base; 
a broad but interrupted fascia not reaching the margin, and the apex rather broadly 
whitish yellow, which there runs a little way up the suture; their surface is impressed 
with irregular somewhat confluent punctures in the middle; and there is a very thin 
brown pile which is only conspicuous at the margins of the thorax and elytra. 
Only one specimen of this, which is perhaps the most beautiful of the Central-American 
Melyride, has been received as yet. 
Subfam. MELY RIDES. 
The second section of the Melyride is not a very homogeneous group, embracing two 
tolerably distinct types of beetles, which may roughly be separated into a more or less 
hairy group, the Dasytides, and those which have the surface almost hairless and with 
deeper sculpture, the Melyrides proper. For the purpose, however, of the present 
work it will be sufficient to consider them a single subfamily, as the representatives 
in Central America are few. 
The first subsection is abundantly represented by species of small size, chiefly from 
the warmer parts of Europe and the Mediterranean district; but a few (which are now 
generally separated from Dasytes) occur in North America, but are nearly or perhaps 
entirely confined to the Pacific side, and in South America to Chill. 
The distribution of the true Melyrides is more universal. Chalchas and Astylus are 
almost confined to South America, Melyris to Africa and India, Arthrobrachys to Chili. 
Australia, Madeira and the Canaries, Mauritius, and Persia furnish each small abnormal 
genera; and this is again the case in North America. The erection of the genus 
Rhadalus, Leconte, into a subfamily is, of course, only the natural local expression of 
this view. 
PRISTOSCELIS, 
Pristoscelis, Leconte, Col. N. Am. i. p. 198. 
The North-American species of Dasytes which are furnished with appendages to the 
claws are grouped by Leconte in this genus. I only include here three species which 
have erect hairs on the body. They may also be separated from the species I place 
ft 2 
