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XIV. On some rare and beautiful Coleopterous Insects from Silhet, chiefly 

 in the Collection of Frederick John Parry, Esq., F.L.S., $c. By the 

 Rev. Frederick William Hope, M.A., F.R.S., F.L.S., $c. 



Read March 1st, 1842. 



1HE last memoir which 1 had the honour of submitting to the notice of the 

 Linnean Society, related to some insects of Assam ; the present communica- 

 tion refers to others from Silhet, a locality south of the former, and for beauty 

 they may justly vie with any which the gorgeous East produces. 



It must be remarked of the above-mentioned localities, that both are extra- 

 tropical, and as they are nearly adjacent, we might naturally anticipate a cer- 

 tain similarity of entomological character. The most remarkable peculiarity, 

 however, is the entire accordance which these extratropical insects evince with 

 those of the torrid zone, a similarity marked not by richness of colouring and 

 metallic splendour only, but also by various typical forms which are regarded 

 as peculiar to the tropics. 



From a careful examination of the insects of the Himalaya along with those 

 of our British East Indian Presidencies, and of others from Chusan, lately sent 

 to England by one of the most indefatigable naturalists of the present day, 

 Dr. Cantor, I have no fear in asserting, that uniformity will be found to be one 

 of the leading characteristics of Indian entomology, and that the insects of 

 Assam, Silhet, and other localities, must be regarded as possessing the tropical 

 characters, although the regions themselves are extratropical. The geogra- 

 phical distribution, therefore, proposed by Latreille, graduated by isothermal 

 lines and climatical parallels, is clearly as artificial and illusory as the imagi- 

 nary lines which are supposed to bound the tropics. 



The collection from which the present novelties are described belongs to 

 Frederick John Parry, Esq. of Cheltenham, the possessor of one of the finest 

 cabinets of exotic insects in Great Britain. The insects were obtained by 



