238 INSECTS ABROAD. 



without scales, so that they sliovv themselves in their original 

 shining blackness, while the elytra are so thickly covered with 

 the scales that not a particle of the black can be seen. 



A STAETLINGLY Strange group of Beetles now comes before 

 us, namely, the Hesthecidge, all Australasian insects. When these 

 Beetles are first seen, it is almost impossible to believe that they 

 belong to the Longicorns, being to all appearance neither more 

 nor less than Brachelytra. Indeed, some of them are not only 

 unlike the Longicorns, but by non-entomologists would scarcely 

 be taken for Beetles at all, as they imitate with wondrous 

 fidelity the forms and colours of sundry hornets and other 

 members of the wasp tribe. 



In all of them the head is sunk as far as the eyes into tlie 

 thorax, and the elytra are quite as short as those of any of the 



Fig, 11.1 — Hesthesis ferrugineus. 

 (Yelluw, with, black baud.) 



Eove Beetles ; but whereas in those insects the wings are cart- 

 fully packed up under the elytra, so as to be quite invisible when 

 they are folded, in the Hesthecides they are as exj)osed as those 

 of a wasp or bee, except just at the base, where they are par- 

 tially covered by the small elytra. It is worthy of notice that 

 the left wing is always crossed over the right. 



Our first example of these Beetles is the largest, handsomest, 

 and most brightly coloured of the whole group, and is called 

 Hesthesis ferrugineus. The latter of these terms signifies " iron 

 fust," and is given to the Beetle in allusion to the reddish yellow 

 down with which nearly the entire upper surface is decorated. 



