BY REV. T. BLACKBURN. 219 



above consists in the coarseness of the puncturation of both the 

 series and the interstices which is such that the series are dis- 

 tinguishable from the interstices only by the seriate arrangement 

 of their punctures. The other two types of elytral sculpture 

 alluded to above present the one a puncturation fine (and more 

 or less equally so) in both series and interstices, the other a 

 puncturation much coarser in the series than in the interstices. 

 But neither of these types of sculpture seems fitted to be regarded 

 as a basis for primary groups, as each of the primary groups so 

 formed would undoubtedly include species obviously much closer 

 ])y their general characters to species in the other of those 

 primary groups than to some of the species in their own primary 

 group. 



The removal from this present large group of Paropsis of the 

 three small subgroups characterised above leaves the vast majority 

 of the species still to be dealt with, and after devoting a very 

 persevering and protracted study to their characters I have had 

 to abandon the hope of discovering any single character on which 

 they can be broken up into smaller aggregates. 1 have as a last 

 resource adopted the expedient of distributing the specimens 

 before me into groups Avhich seem fairly natural on a considera- 

 tion of a combination of characters, and then endeavouring to 

 specify the features which in combination each possesses. The 

 characters which come nearest to being satisfactory for forming 

 primary groups are [a) the carination or not of the hinder portion 

 of the suture; (i) the presence or absence of a deep well-defined 

 fovea (as distinguished from an ill defined impression or a 

 marginal flattening) on the prothorax near the lateral margin on 

 either side; (c) the nature of the hind angles of the prothorax. 



Using these characters, I first separate a subgroup which 

 should stand as the first of this group distinguished in the main 

 by the presence of prothoracic fove* and the flatness of the 

 hinder part of the suture. Most of the species forming the sub- 

 group possess these characters in combination. Carination of the 

 suture is not absolutely wanting among them, but the species in 

 which it occurs have the prothoracic fovepe strongly defined, and 



