1910.] 5 



fumidulvs is very little knowii on the Continent, being confined to the 

 western portion of Europe and Algeria. As regards its distribution 

 in this country I may say that the species is fairly common in Scotland, 

 but is apparently rarer in England, though it has been taken in 

 numbers at Mickleham, &c. It used to occur at Hammersmith, and I 

 have found it at Lyndhurst and in the Isle of Wight. Its food-plant 

 is Heracleum, a common JJmbellifer. 



Ph^don. 

 In this genus the metasternal line is elongate and is turned 

 backwards externally and meets the episternal suture nearer the hind- 

 margin than to the front ; there is no cavity for the reception of the 

 intermediate femora, and the prosternum is not carinate. Although 

 the species are at first sight very similar, yet I find that we have 

 undoubtedly three and that they were quite correctly distinguished by 

 Bedel. They liave also been diagnosed by Fowler (Brit. Col. iv, p. 

 316), still there are other characters not mentioned by these authors, 

 and I may therefore be excused for some repetition. 



P. AEMORACI^. 



Usually larger than the other members of the genus and of a dark steel- 

 blue cohjui', with a prominent shovilder to the elytra, which is always limited 

 on the scutellar side by a well-marked depression ; the joints of the club of the 

 antennae are broad and shox't, 7 — 10 being distinctly transverse, and there is no 

 trace of any red colour on the under-sides of the basal joints ; the sculpture of 

 the elytra is strong, all the striae being well-marked, and the interstitial 

 punctuation is quite distinct ; on the under-side the margin of the terminal 

 plate is pale red, and the ventral plates and the breast exhibit a pectdiar silky 

 smoothness, with the punctviation compai-atively little developed. The varia- 

 tion is but slight. 



P. CONCINNUS. 



Rather smaller, narrower and more convex that P. armoracim, with the 

 humeral callus somewhat less marked, and the serial punctuation of the elytra 

 more shallow ; the antennae are always quite black, and are not quite so broad 

 as in P. annoracim ; on the under-side there is no red colour on the terminal 

 plate, the surface generally is more punctate, and the metasternimi is shorter 

 than in P. armoraciae. 



The coloiu' is usually bright green or golden-green, but this occasionally 

 varies, and specimens may be fovind of a violet-gi-een or cupreous colour, but 

 none are of the colour of P. armoraciae. In P. concinnus both upper and 

 under-surface exhibit a peculiar faint strigosity, which has led to the species 

 being sometimes described as finely rugose. There is but little variation 

 except in colour. The violet individuals are a good deal like P. cochleariw, and 



