INTRODUCTION cxxxv 



independently from winged forms, and are not closely allied to one another. So far as 

 at present known they contain few species, only nine in all having been discovered. 



The species of Goniothorax and Gonioryctus, with nine and twenty-four species 

 respectively, show considerable diversity of habits, some frequenting the fleshy in- 

 florescence of Freycinetia, others living at the base of the leaves of this plant or 

 Astelia, the fresh flowers of which are attractive to the adults ; some are found in 

 flowers of Lobeliaceous plants, and breed in the almost liquid, decaying stems of these 

 trees, of Cheirodcndron and others ; some live and breed beneath the bark of hard- 

 wooded trees like Acacia koa, and others in decaying tree-ferns. The flightless species 

 of Nesaptcriis have the habits of the latter. The species of Orthostolus breed in the 

 semiliquid mess or exudations beneath the bark of Lobeliaceous trees or others. 

 Several are attached to Acacia koa and usually a number of examples, from three 

 or four to a hundred or more, are found in company. Apetimis is either terrestrial, or 

 found beneath bark of decaying branches. Eupetiniis contains 24 species, and is allied 

 to the preceding, but fully winged. Many of the species are very common insects and 

 the individuals vary much, .so that the specific distinctions are extremely difficult to 

 make out. I spent a great deal of time in the collection of colonies of species 

 of the ' impressus ' group in order to try and understand the limits of variation of 

 these, but owing to apparently distinct species being found together and the variability 

 of all, I was not able to arrive at any satisfactory conclusion. The individual species 

 show a good deal of variation in their habits, breeding in quite different plants. Most 

 of them are attached to dead wood, or to fleshy flowers and decaying inflorescences, 

 and a few to tree-ferns. All are very sluggish, and it is seldom that one is seen on the 

 wing, but possibly they are nocturnal in their activities. The large genus Nesopeplus 

 with 32 and Nesopetiims with 25 species seem closely connected by some of their forms, 

 and the latter has species evidently connecting with Gonioryctus, so that in collecting 

 I always supposed them to be small species of the latter genus. This is the case with 

 the common N. tinctus, which is sometimes found with Goniorycttis on flowers of 

 Astelia. Some of the species of these large genera have habits like those of Eupetinus 

 and are found in company with them on Lobeliaceous flowers and Freycinetia and also 

 in fruits of forest trees, but others frequent small inconspicuous flowers, e.g. those of 

 Kadua, and even the larvae have been found in these. Some are evidently very 

 particular as to the kind of tree they frequent, or are entirely restricted to one kind, but 

 others are much less fastidious. Some breed in rotten stems of tree-ferns. Many of 

 the flower-frequenting species do not breed in the flowers, but only resort to these for 

 food, apparently eating the pollen, with which they are sometimes quite covered. The 

 Ohia flowers, with their abundant nectar seem to be rarely or never visited, though the 

 beetles may be obtained from the dead wood. Many species are very abundant and 

 they are very difficult to determine and will no doubt be much more so, when all that 

 exist have been collected. Notopeplus reitteri is an isolated form, attached to the 



