404 COLEUPTERA OF NORTH AMERICA. 



tiirsi dilated, first point scarcely longer, third bilobed ; claws 

 divergent, appendiculate, toothed, or simple. 



The species of this sub-family are small, and have a peculiar and 

 easily recognized appearance. Lacordaire has placed them, as a 

 tribe, near his Attelabides, with which, however, as will be seen 

 by the foregoing description, they have but little resemblance or 

 affinity. 



Lacordaire describes them as apterous; in all the species we 

 have eiarained the wings are quite well developed. We also find 

 that in many of our species the claws are toothed or appendicu- 

 late, while in a few they are simple, and we have therefore 

 attempted to group them in our collections upon those characters, 

 the position of the antennae, and the relative length of the first 

 and second joints of those organs. 



The species are numerous in all parts of our country, and many 

 are yet undescribed. 



Sub-Family V.— CURCULIONIN^. 



The species of this sub-family may be recognized by the man- 

 dibles being rarely emarginate at tip, Ijut either bi-emarginate, 

 with three apical cusps, or oblique, with three cusps on the inner 

 side, which sometimes become effaced or obsolete. In the first 

 tribes the inferior cusp is also smaller, and less prominent, but it 

 speedily becomes more developed, and it is by the final dominance 

 of that cusp, with the edge of the mandible which corresponds 

 to it, that the oblique form with the teeth on the inner edge, is 

 assumed; and a still greater prominence of this inferior edge and 

 cusp results in the oblique or flattened form of mandible seen in 

 certain Cryptorhynchini and Barini. From them the transition 

 is easy to the next sub-family Balanininie in which the mandibles 

 are still more depressed, and the condyle instead of being on the 

 outer side comes to the upper surface, so that the movement is 

 vertical, instead of horizontal as in all other Coleoptera. 



It must also be observed that in certain Phytonoraini the inte- 

 rior cusp becomes very small or obsolete, so that the mandibles 

 seem lo be only emarginate at tip. They thus approach the first 

 three sub-families, but are readily known by not possessing the 

 peculiar characters which distinguish each of them. The beak 

 is not short and flat, and the eyes are not round, as in Sito- 

 ninsE; the giilar margin is not prominent as in Alophinaj ; and 



