BY REV. T. BLACKBURN. 



639 



The present memoir begins with Group iii. I have ah'early 

 read a paper to the Royal Soc. of S.A. (Tr. Roy. Soc. S.A. 1894)' 

 on Dr. Chapuis' Group i. (my i, and ii.), but during the interval 

 since its publication so many new species of that group have 

 come into my hands that it will be desirable to deal with it afresh, 

 and as the new material thi'ows fresh light on and modifies a con- 

 siderable part of the work there seems to be almost a necessity 

 for rewriting my paper on it. This, however, I purpose post- 

 poning until I have finished my work on the other groups, and, 

 therefore, I begin with the first group that has as yet received no 

 systematic treatment. 



The section of Paropsis to be now dealt with, — that containing 

 the species with about 20 rows of punctures, and also with 

 verrucce, on each elytron, — is for more than one reason, the most 

 difficult in the genus to treat satisfactorily. It is one of the two 

 sections containing a very large number of species, the species 

 appertaining to it are mostly obscure, closely allied and very 

 variable, and many of those already named are described in a 

 manner that completely defies identification. 



Dr. Chapuis (Joe. cit.) enumerates 42 species as forming this 

 group, but there are doubtless others among the 43 species 

 enumerated by him as unable to he referred to a definite place in 

 Paropsis. Since the publication of Dr. Chapuis' memoir onl}^ 

 5 species have been added. Dr. Chapuis' descriptions are far from 

 satisfactory, because they are mere diagnoses without any notes 

 of comparison between one species and another, and because they 

 deal with colour and marking to an extent that is misleading in 

 dealing with variable insects. I have, however, been fortunate 

 enough (through the courtesy of M. Sevrin, of Brussels) to secure 

 a considerable collection of types and named specimens from Dr. 

 Chapuis' collection, without which I could not have ventured on 

 the present work, but even with this assistance there is an 

 unsatisfactory number of names that I have been compelled to 

 disregard totally as incapable of identification with any particular 

 species; many of the descriptions annexed to them might refer to 

 almost any species of the group. 



