4 Mr. A. Murray's Monograph of the genus Catops. 



sections, dependent upon the antennae being filiform or clavate, 

 the posterior angles of the thorax obtuse or acute, and the 

 elytra striate or not striate ; the dilatation or non-dilatation of 

 the first article of the middle tarsi in the males was also made 

 a subordinate character. Of these, the first and last are the 

 only ones which have been adopted as sectional characters by 

 subsequent authors ; but the form of the hinder angles of the 

 thorax, although not a good sectional character by itself, will, I 

 think, if taken in conjunction with the base of the elytra, be 

 found to furnish good characters for natural subdivision. Mr. 

 Spence groups his species under the above sectional characters 

 (to each of which I shall attach the synonym now most in use) 

 as follows, viz. : — 



* Antenna subjiliform ; posterior angles of thorax obtuse ( = Sub- 

 gen. Choleva, Steph.). 



!}->,.> ._ J.VIl 



C. ohlonga = angustata, Fab., Erich. !,"" 



C, agilis = agilis, 111., Erich. i--— ~**»^as«M\.0 



** Antenna clavate ; posterior angles of thorax acute ; elytra for 

 the most part striated ( = Subgen. Catops, Steph.). 

 {Anterior thighs for the most part thickened at the apex in the 

 males, and first article of middle tarsi dilated.) 



a. Basal margin of thorax excised near the angles. 



C. nigricans = nigricans, Erich. 

 C. sericea=fuscus, Panz., Erich.* 



* Erichson, and after him Kraatz, give C. picipes, Fab., as the synonym 

 of Spence's sericea, but I think this is a mistake. The description better 

 accords with fuscus, and I believe that picipes has not yet been found in 

 Britain. I recorded it in my ' Catalogue of Scottish Coleoptera ' as found 

 by myself in Scotland, but I am now satisfied that the specimen on which 

 I relied was only a large variety of nigricans. If Erichson formed his opi- 

 nion of the synonymy from not finding any other probable representative 

 oi picipes among Spence's species, the circumstance of its not being British 

 explains how this may be. If he judged from Spence's description, he 

 may have been misled by the commencing words used by Spence, " Body 

 broader and more convex than in its congeners/' which he might apply to 

 picipes, which is the largest species in the genus ; and by Spence's next 

 words, " shorter than the preceding," viz. nigricans, he might have sup- 

 posed him to mean less elongate in form, which picipes is, although cer- 

 tainly not actually shorter — it being longer. The only other resemblance to 

 picipes is the black elytra ; but Paykull's description of his C. sericeus, to 

 which Spence refers as in all other respects identical with his, corrects this 

 incongruity, for Paykull states the elytra of his species to be obscure tes- 

 taceous. In Stephens's collection sericea is represented by a pale variety 

 of chrysomeloides. 



