NORTH AMERICAN COLEOPTERA. 209 



Revision of the species of L.ACH]«OSTERNA of 

 America North or Mexico. 



BY GEORGE H. HORN, M. D. 



Since the publication of the " Revision" by Dr. LeConte, in 1856, 

 practically nothing has been done with the numerous species which 

 have accumulated in our cabinets. As it is never profitable to de- 

 scribe isolated species in troublesome genera, it was thought better 

 to accumulate as large series as possible in order to determine the 

 limits of variation, and thereby fix the value of many described 

 from uniques. Unfortunately, many of the uniques were females, 

 and without the opposite sex it was nearly impossible to fix their 

 correct position in the groups in relation to those whose males were 

 known. The process of accumulation produced at last such an over- 

 crowding and confusion as to render the material of no value without 

 arrrangement, and a preliminary study showed that the males were 

 known of all the described species with two exceptions, cequalis and 

 uitida, while of the vast majority both sexes were present. 



Having succeeded thus far with the species, of which the types 

 were accessible to me in the cabinet of Dr. LeConte, there remained 

 the task of correctly identifying those passed over by Dr. LeConte 

 as unknown or unrecognized which had been described by Blanchard, 

 in France, and Burmeister, in Germany. Fortunately the types of 

 the former had been studied by us in the Museum of the Jardin des 

 Plantes with the kind assistance of MM. Blanchard and Lucas. 

 The Burmeister types have not been seen by either of us ; however, 

 many if not all the specimens were sent to that author by Dr. Chas. 

 Zimmerman, in whose collection now at Cambridge several species 

 have been found with the number as used by Burmeister. It is 

 inexplicable how three of the species escaped recognition by Di-. 

 LeConte. 



In the following pages 81 species are described ; of these both 

 sexes are known in 60 ; 17 have been described from males, and of 

 this number 6 are unique; 4 from females, of which 3 are uni(|ue. 

 The material used is as follo\v^: 



TRANS. AMER. ENT. SOC. XIV. (27) NOVEMBER, 1887. 



