144 Mr. A. Murray ^s Monograph of the genus Catops. 



This species is widely spread, and is found under leaves, and 

 under the carcases of birds and small mammals. 



14. C. tristis, Panz. 



Helops tristis, Panz. Fn. Germ. 8. 1. 

 Choleva Leachii *, Spence, Linn. Trans, xi. 

 Catops tristis, var., Gyll. Ins. Suec. iv. 312. 1. 



tristis, Erichs. Kaf. d. M. Br. i. 238. 8. 



nigrita, Sturm, Deutschl. Faun. xiv. 24. 11, t. 2/5. f. c. C. 



tristis, Ileer, Fn. Helv. i. 380. 8; Redt. Fn. Aust. 144. 12; Kraatz, 



Stett. But. Zeit. xiii. 433. 18 ; Fairm. & Laboulb. Fn. Ent. Fr. i.302. 



Fig. 14. 



Oblongo-ovatus, niger ; antennis abrupte clavatis, 

 clava fuscQf articulo ultimo hreviori; thorace 

 transverso basi apiceque latitudine subsequali, 

 angulis posticis rectis ; elytris obsoletissime 

 striatis. 



Long. If lin. 



Of the same size and general form as the last 

 species [nigrita^ Erichs.) ; the thorax, however, 

 is not so broad, particularly behind. Perhaps 

 the commonest impression it makes on a first 

 introduction is that of an insect with longish elytra and a dis- 

 proportionately short, narrow, somewhat square thorax. The 

 antennae are nearly as long as the head and thorax, strongly 

 thickened towards the point ; the first six joints slender, reddish 

 brown, those following brown, broader than long, the eighth 

 not only much shorter but also narrower than the remainder of 

 the club, the last a little larger than the preceding, with a cone- 

 shaped point, generally pale at the tipf. The head and thorax 

 are black, densely punctate, more or less wrinkled transversely, 

 and thickly covered with a close yellow pubescence ; the hairs 

 springing from the wrinkled punctuation as shown in the 

 magnified sketch represented in fig. 15. 

 The thorax oncrhalf broader than long, 

 rounded on the sides, broadest in the 

 middle, or perhaps rather a little before 

 the middle, giving the primd-facie effect 

 of being narrowest behind ; but on com- 

 paring the narrowness both in front and 

 behind it is found nearly equal, or rather 

 narrower before than behind. The posterior angles are sharply 

 right-angled, the straight edge proceeding a little forward before 



* As already mentioned, I have been unable to make out satisfactorily 

 what the tristis of Spence is, and therefore have not added that as a syn- 

 onym here. 



t Erichson says that the last joint is brown hke the preceding:, })ut this 

 i« only the case sometimes ; generally s[)eaking: it is paler. 



Fig. 15. 



