_ EPITRAGUS. 23 
EPITRAGUS. 
Epitragus, Latreille, Hist. Nat. Crust. et Ins. x. p. 822 (1804) ; Lec. Class. Col. N. A. part i. p. 215 
(1862) ; Horn, Rev. Ten. N. A. p. 263 (1870) ; Lec. & Horn, Class. Col. N. A. p. 363 (1883). 
This New-World genus, as here understood, ranges from the Southern United States 
to the Argentine Republic, occurring also in the Sandwich Islands and in the West 
Indies. Most of the Peruvian and all the Chilian species at present referred to Epi- 
tragus will probably have to be placed in other genera. All the species here referred 
to it have a prominent prosternal process received by the mesosternum, which is 
furnished with a strong V-shaped elevation, concave within. The genus is readily 
divided into two sections—one with the middle lobe of the epistoma emarginate in 
front, EL. fuscus, Latr., from Cayenne, and the type of the genus, belongs to this group, 
which ranges from Mexico to Buenos Ayres; the other, with the epistoma produced 
and rounded in front (the anterior margin of the head appearing trilobed), of wider 
and more northern distribution. Numerous large metallic brassy or bronze species of 
the second group are peculiar to the Southern States, Mexico, and Guatemala. The 
females (not the males, as stated by Leconte) of some of the species found in the 
Southern States and Mexico have the disc of the thorax flattened and with a promi- 
nent elevation on each side, often excavated within and enclosing a scutiform or 
triangular excavation. Some allied genera (Nyctopetus and Geoborus) are peculiar to 
Chili and Peru, and Chilometopon, Horn, to California. But few of the South-American 
species have been described as yet, though numerous in collections. pitragus is well 
represented in Central America by upwards of thirty species. ‘The different species are 
found upon leaves and herbage, and, unlike the allied groups, seem to like the sun. 
One species has been bred from cocoons found in the earth. These insects when 
freshly emerged are, in addition to the usual pubescence, densely covered with a sort of 
mealy efflorescence, which soon wears off. 
Sect. 1. Epistoma emarginate in front. 
1. Epitragus aurulentus. (Tab. I. fig. 19.) 
Epitragus aurulentus, Kirsch, Berl. Zeit. 1866, p. 189°. 
Epitragus denticulatus, Maklin in litt. 
Hab. Mexico?; Costa Rica (coll. F. Bates, Van Patten), Irazu (Rogers); Panama, 
Volcan de Chiriqui, La Caldera, David, Bugaba, Tolé (Champion).—CoLomBia, Bogota !; 
Jamaica; BRraziu? 
This is a common species in the State of Panama. It may be known from the others 
of the section, in which the epistoma is emarginate in front, by the variegated golden 
pubescence of the thorax; the thorax is wider behind, the hind angles more acute and 
the punctuation closer and finer, and the rows of elytral punctures deeper and stronger 
