346 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



while certain silver markings on the wing-covers are composed 

 of similar close-set, fine hairs. Those hairs on the sides of the 

 prothorax enclose a conspicuous black spot, while the top is 

 black, and more coarsely punctate than the wing-covers. The 

 latter are each crossed by four acutely zigzag lines, composed of 

 microscopic hairs, forming w-like bands on the elytra, the basal 

 lines being less distinctly marked than the others. The ends of 

 the wing-covers are also tipped with gray, especially on the 

 inner side of the end The legs are pitchy brown with light 

 hairs, and with a reddish tinge on the terminal joints (tarsi). 

 It is a little over half an inch long. 



The Oak Callidium. — This is also a new borer in the oak, 

 specimens having been taken by Mr. Alfred Poor from a white 

 oak stick, June 20th, and presented by him to the Essex Insti- 

 tute several years ago. It is undoubtedly closely similar in its 

 habits and in the form of the larva to the Grape Callidium fig- 

 ured in our last report. This is the Callidium variabile, and 

 is one of our more common species of the genus. It is closely 

 allied to C. amcenum, but is larger, and less coarsely punctured, 

 while the antennae are more reddish ; the scutellum is concolor- 

 ous with the wing-covers. The body, legs, except the femora, 

 which are blackish in the middle, and antennae, are reddish, the 

 tips of the joints of the latter dark, and on the back of the pro- 

 thorax are two black spots, often confluent. The head is black. 

 The wing-covers are prussian blue, smooth, finely punctured, 

 with rather thick, fine, black hairs, bent downwards. Specimens 

 recently changed from the pupa state are brown, and the 

 species is exposed to considerable variation, as its name indicates. 

 The male is just half an inch long, the female .60 inch. 



The Black Elm- Tree Borer. — This is a new borer in the 

 elm, a tree also remarkably free from borers. I am indebted to 

 Mr. G. D. Smith, of Boston, from whose immense collection of 

 beetles the specimen I here describe was taken and given to the 

 museum of the Peabody Academy. It is the Physocnemun 

 brevilineum Say (Pig 13, nat. size). It is a singular-looking 

 beetle, with a round, flattened prothorax, and wing-covers con- 

 tracted in the middle, and not covering the tip of the abdomen, 



