18S7.] 



" The only explanation that occurs to me o£ the error into which 

 Baron von Mueller was no doubt led by some non-entomological friend 

 is this, that a moth had deposited her eggs upon or near a cluster of 

 old and empty galls, and the young caterpillars had appropriated the 

 galls to their own purposes. There are quantities of Lepidopterous 

 larva) under the dead bark or in chinks and cracks of every gum tree, 

 and for many of the smaller kinds the cavity of the gall with tbe 

 orifice enlarged would prove a very convenient place for pupation." 



Adelaide : March 23rd, 1887. 



ON A NEW GENUS OP JSROTYLIDM. 

 BY GEORGE LEWIS, F.L.S. 



In vol. XX of the Ent. Mo. Mag., p. 138 (1883), I described a 

 species of the above Family as Episcai^ha 2)erforata,\)nt I find now, 

 on a further study of the group and of three similar species from 

 Japan, that the insect requires a genus to be formed for its recep- 

 tion. And I also see that the four Japanese species are congeneric 

 with Megalodacne Ulkei, Crotch, and it is this last named species that 

 I now propose to treat of as the type of the genus Microsternus. 



The chief characteristics of Microsternus are, in the first place, 

 the very narrow, almost inconspicuous, transverse mesosternum, and 

 in the second the form of the presternum. The presternum is, as 

 stated by Crotch (Trans. Amer. Ent. Soc, p. 353, 1873, as a specific 

 character of Megalodacne Ulkei), raised and triangular. The narrow 

 and transverse mesosternum of 3Iicrosfernus points to an alliance with 

 Atdacochilus, and so also does the form of the presternum. The 

 sternal plates of Microstermis UlJcei are represented here by fig. 1, 

 and fig. 2, given for comparison, shows the outlines of AulacochiJus 

 violaceus, Germ. 



fig. 1 fig. 2 



Megalodacne and Episcapha are closely allied genera, but both 

 have a mesosternal structure which is conspicuous between the middle 

 coxje, and this character separates them in a very marked degree from 



