BY THOMAS G. SLOANE. 461 



solitarily in holes about a foot long dug by the occupant, and 

 usually placed under a fallen log in dry forest country. The 

 type of Scaraphites howittii, Casteln., in the Howitt Collection, I 

 have compared with a male specimen of B. obesus, Macl., and 

 found it the same species. 



Genus Laccopterum. 



It seems clear that Carenum cyaneum, Fabr., should be 

 placed in this genus ; its evident affinity being to Laccopterum 

 deauratum, Macl. In his review of the Carenides in 1887, Sir 

 William Macleay omitted to place his Carenumi digglesi in this 

 genus which is its proper place. Carenum multiimpressum, 

 Casteln., is another species, evidently a Laccopterum, that Sir 

 William Macleay has not included in his list of the genus. In 

 Mr. Masters' valuable Catalogue all these species appear under 

 the genus Caremum. 



Genus Carenum. 



As explained in the introductory note to this paper, I now 

 prefer to use the generic term Carenum in as wide a sense as 

 possible, rather than to break up the groups of species that can be 

 included in it into genera ; if the latter coarse be adopted it will 

 become necessary, if any degree of uniformity of classification is 

 to be maintained, to add several new generic names to the 

 Carenides, there being several described species which are 

 certainly as much entitled to be considered types of new genera 

 as those on which the genera excluded in this paper have been 

 founded ; further, it will be noticed on examining a full series of 

 species, that sometimes species which seem so different as appa- 

 rently to justify their being placed in different genera, are so 

 linked together by other species that it becomes almost impossible 

 to indicate any break in the chain. Indeed the whole tribe of the 

 Carenides proves so closely connected, as our knowledge of the 

 immense number and variety of the species increases, that it 

 becomes more and more difficult to find good and satisfactory dis- 

 tinctions between the recognised genera. 



