Sept.-Dec, 1920.I BaRHER AND ElLIS : TlIE FAMILY CUPEDID^. 199 



Ganglbauer (i8) for this reason, and because the sternites and 

 pleurae of the second abdominal segment are completely fused with 

 those of the third, considers the group a more modified family of the 

 Adephaga. Gahan (25 and 26, p. 166) gives as an additional reason 

 in support of this disposition of the family that there is a suture on 

 each side of the prothorax between the notum and the pleurae, a con- 

 dition met with only in the Adephaga. 



Gahan (26, p. 247) has shown that Lameere was mistaken in be- 

 lieving that the second and third abdominal segments are entirely 

 separate which was his reason for considering the family the most 

 primitive of the Adephaga. 



Because of the complete fusion of the sternites and pleurae of the 

 second and third abdominal segments, Kolbe (20) removed the family 

 from the Adephaga and placed it in the Polyphaga but Gahan (25 

 and 26, p. 166) has shown an additional reason, as stated previously, 

 why this should not be done. 



With the description and figuring of the larvae and ])upx of Cupcs 

 concolor Westw., Snyder (27), the subject is anything but cleared 

 and Gahan's (26) opinion will perhaps be reversed. 



Lameere (Gahan (26), p. 166) believed that the larvae live in 

 wood and are of the cruciform type. Snyder (27) has shown that 

 the larvae are of the eruciform type and do live in wood; in fact, they 

 greatly depart from the campodeiform type, and he states that the 

 legs are five-segmented with a single claw, approaching somewhat 

 larvae of the Lymexilonidae in appearance. These characters are, in- 

 deed, widely different from the campodeiform larvae with six-seg- 

 mented legs and tarsi with two claws that are found in the Adephaga,. 

 although Gahan has shown here that one exception is now known in 

 Adephagan larvae in the family Paussidae which Dr. Boving describes, 

 as having only five segments in each leg. 



We must, if we are to admit that the two suborders, Adephaga 

 and Polyphaga, are the true major divisions of the Coleoptera, weigh 

 these points very carefully in deciding the position that the Cupedidiie 

 should hold. The characters may be summed up as follows : 



