GALERUCINE BEETLES — BLAKE 61 



very close to the rest of this homogeneous little group, so that the lack 

 of these sex characters seemed only incidental and not at all com- 

 parable with the marked differences between the species of LeConte's 

 genus Phyllecthrus and Jacoby's Luperosoma. H. S. Barber, in fact, 

 suggested to me putting Horn's much larger species, suhsulcatus, 

 schwarzi, and parallelus, into my West Indian Ectmesopus . But not 

 only is there the much smaller size of Ectmesopus species, but also the 

 shape of the prothorax is unlike that of LeConte's, Horn's or Jacoby's 

 genera, in that the West Indian beetles have a smoothly convex 

 prothorax without any hint of transverse depression. They form a 

 distinct little group of beetles probably endemic in the West Indies, 

 and it seems best to keep them separate. As above indicated, Horn's 

 species fit better into Jacoby's genus Luperosoma. 



In dealing with the Galerucini it has been my experience that in the 

 sex characters of the males there is an infinite variety of forms, many 

 so unusual as to merit generic recognition. Note the monotypic 

 genus Oroetes described by Jacoby. In common with Phyllecthrus 

 and Ectmesopus, Oroetes Jlavicollis has notched middle tibiae in the 

 male, but the male antennae somewhat resemble those of Cerotoma 

 in being cut out, but in a different way from Cerotoma. Like Cerotoma, 

 too, is the excavation of the face. This excavation of the face is also 

 found in certain beetles at present ascribed to the genera Neohrotica 

 and Eucerotoma as weU as in species of the Asiatic and African genus 

 Palpoxena. The prothorax in Oroetes in addition has a peculiar 

 median tubercle in the male. 



Another peculiar beetle is Diabrotica cyanospila Suffrian, which has 

 both enlarged antennal joints and cut out middle tibiae in the male, 

 and does not have bifid claws, the one character that always distin- 

 guishes the Diabrotica group. There is still another male character 

 in cyanospila that I have not found in any of the others with notched 

 middle tibiae, and that is a gi-eatly enlarged hind femur in the male, 

 so that it would seem almost like an alticid. I have found one other 

 instance of such enlargement of the hind femora in the male, that is 

 in Leptoxena eximia Baly, a monotype from the Andaman Islands. 

 In this species also the male antennae are dilated. There are no 

 notched middle tibiae, however, and the beetle itself has a quite 

 different aspect. Suffrian describes cyanospila as an Altica-hke beetle, 

 although he does not mention the enlarged femora nor the dilated 

 antennal joints, leading me to beheve that he had examined no males. 

 In his description of Diabrotica semicyanea, which foUows the descrip- 

 tion of D. cyanospila, he stated that one specimen had a quite abnormal 

 build of the last joints of the antennae in that the last joint is spoon- 

 shaped and the preceding broadened. He believed it was a male of 

 semicyanea. He did not mention in either case the excised middle 



