186 ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY 
America it extends to the extreme southern portion of the coun- 
try. Another equally easily recognized species, Adoxus vitis, 
occurs throughout the Palaearctic region and lives upon a wild 
plant (Galium) and upon grape-vine, doing so much damage 
thereto that, in France, it has received a popular name, u le gri- 
burier." In our country the species is strictly arctic or alpine, 
feeds upon the same wild plant, but has never shown any dispo- 
sition to feed upon grape-vine or to extend its range. Silpha 
lapponica occurs all over North America (except in the south- 
east), being still common as far south as San Diego, Cal. In 
Europe it is strictly arctic, and does not even occur in the Alpine 
regions. On the other hand, Silpha opaca is common all over 
Europe, and has even acquired there some economic importance, 
whereas the identical species is strictly arctic in North America 
(a single specimen in the LeConte cabinet is from the high Sierras 
of California). The following are examples of remarkable dis- 
tribution of which I am unable to offer a satisfactory explanation : 
Nomius pygmceus, a neat-looking Carabid beetle, but justly 
dreaded by all those who had an opportunity of finding it, on ac- 
count of its overpowering, foetid odor, occurs in Washington Ter- 
ritory, Oregon, at Lake Superior, and on the high mountains of 
North Carolina, a distribution participated in by several species 
of distinctly arctic origin. The same species occurs as an extreme 
rarity in southern Europe, specimens being occasionally found in 
southern France, Hungary, and Greece. An importation of this 
species, which is by no means common even in North America, 
by the agency of man is utterly inconceivable. Aphodius rtifipes, 
a species common all over Europe and Siberia, and in all proba- 
bility belonging to the circumpolar fauna, occurs in North America 
only in the Alleghany Mountains, but not in the Arctic region. 
Hypocoprus lathridioides, a myrmecophilous species, is widely 
distributed in Europe, but has in North America been found only 
in the Subalpine region of Colorado. 
The mountain ranges in America run in the direction from 
north to south, and the colonies of circumpolar insects upon their 
summits have thus been able to preserve their connection and 
specific identity with the arctic forms ; whereas in Europe, where 
the mountain ranges run from east to west, the alpine colonies 
have generally undergone changes and, by isolation, lost their 
