88 '-^"'y- 



Olibktjs pakticeps, Mulsant, Opusc. Eiit. 61, 127. — M. Touniier refers to 

 this species an English insect communicated to him by me, and which was given 

 to me by Dr. Power as 0. ajjinis ; the latter is unknown to me as British, and 

 would appear, in spite of the constant references to it as a common species on the 

 continent, to be not abundant anywhere, as M. Touruier only possesses a very small 

 number of it. 



Olibkits bicolor. Fab. — This species, rejected by me from the Catalogue an- 

 nexed to my ' British Beetles,' is again in our lists. As far as my own knowledge 

 goes, I may obserye that lai'ge and brightly-colored specimens, representing the 

 hicolor var. Jlavicornis of Mr. Waterhouse's Catalogue, as well as much smaller 

 and darker individuals, are (as anticipated) retm*ned to me by M. Tournier as 

 O. Jiquidus, Er. 



CRYPTOPHAatrs ETTFicoBNis, Steph. — Among some beetles sent to me for 

 examination by that hard-working and successful collector, Mr. J. Bay Hardy, of 

 Manchester (shortly before his starting on an entomological expedition to California, 

 where he now is), were a few examples of the very rare Cri/ptophagns ruficornis, 

 taken by him last year out of fungus {PoJyporus) on dead birch trees, at Chat Moss. 

 As Dr. Sharp has well observed to me, this species should be placed in the same 

 section of its genus as pilosus, instead of being associated with dentatus, where it 

 now stands in our Catalogues. 



As it is apparently not known to continental entomologists, it may not be 

 altogether iiseless if I were, from the material at my disposal, to give a brief diagnosis 

 of it here ; although, if only from its striking peculiarity of coloiu", Stephens' descrip- 

 tion seems sufficient for its recognition. 



l_S'ectio '* Das Halsschild mit Schwiclenhockern,' Erichson.] 



Cryptophagus ruficornis : elongatus, suhcylindricus, sat profunde minus dense 

 punctatus, rufo-piceus, elytris (prceter humeros maculamque apicalem in- 

 determinatam dilidiores) nigro-piceis, antennis pedibusgue rufo-ferrugineis ; 

 puhe fulvescenti sub-erectd sparsim vestitus ; capite minore, antennarum 

 clavd, ut in 0. setuloso, abruptius majore ; prothorace sub-quadrato-trans- 

 verso, basin versus vix angustaio, lateribus hidentatis, dente anteriore pro- 

 minulo posterius acuto, posteriore ohhisiusculo ad ^nedium sito, margine 

 laterali incrassato, evidenter crenulato ; elytris sat regulariter punctata- 

 striatis. Long. corp. 1 — ]| lin. (Anglic), 



Stephens, lU. Mand., iii, p. 78 ; id., Manual, p. 137. 



This insect is about the size and build of average specimens of C. dentatus, 

 from which it is at once removed by its thorax possessing four irregularly smooth 

 disco-lateral callosities and an evident (though very delicate) carina in the middle 

 of its transverse basal depression. These sectional characters, however, appear to 

 me to be but various degrees of development of a structure belonging to the whole 

 genus, and not to be trustworthy. But its-color (suggestive, perhaps, of a mixture 

 of that of C. serratus and C. scaiiicux), and its deep punctuation, which on the elytra 

 is about of the same degree as that of the former of those sjiecies, but rather more 

 disposed in stria?, which arc more closely packed, readily distinguish it from all of its 

 genus known lo me. The anterior dcnlicle of its thorax is a tridc more projectiim 



