ORYCTES. 277 



excavation extending from the front to about the middle, the hind 

 margin being very feebly produced forwards into a slight bifid 

 process. The posterior half of the pronotum is smooth and 

 shining, with only a few minute punctures ; the front angles are 

 depressed and rugose, and there is a narrow rugose area near the 

 median excavation on each side. The pygidium is bare, smooth 

 and shining in the middle, where there are only minute punctures, 

 and coriaceous at the sides. 



5 . T!ie head is entirely rugose and armed with a very short 

 horn. The pronotum has an anterior rugose depression which 

 does not reach the middle, aud the posterior margin of this is 

 feebly produced forward into a blunt point. There is a small 

 punctured area just behind this point and a large rugose depression 

 on each side. The pygidium is pointed and clothed Avith rather 

 long tawny hairs. 



Length 24-35 mm. ; breadth 12'5-17 mm. 



SiND : Karachi ; Peesia ; Arabia : Muscat, Fao, Lahej. 



Tyjoe in the British Museum ; that of siaaicus destroyed. 



This is probably the Oryctes siaaicus of Walker, presumably 

 brought from the Sinai Peninsula, but the type of that, together 

 with the numerous other Coleoptera described by Walker in the 

 same paper, no longer exist, and as few of the species will ever 

 be determined with any degree of certainty from the descriptions 

 I consider it best to treat the names as, like the types, non- 

 existent. The collection was housed in the School of Medicine at 

 Cairo, but the late Director of that Institution, Dr. Innes, informs 

 me that, through neglect, the insects had entirely disappeared more 

 than twenty years ago, and only the labels remain. 



250. Oryctes nudicauda, sp. n. 



Deep chestnut-colour, with the lower surface reddish, clothed 

 Avith tawny hairs. The form is narrowly cylindrical and the 

 general structure that of Oryctes rhinoceros, L. The clypeus is 

 sharply cleft, the points not strongly diverging and the horn is 

 rugosely punctured, except at the base behind. The pronotum is 

 distinctly transverse, strongly margined all round, with the front 

 angles acute, the hind angles almost obliterated and the sides 

 strongly bisinuated. There is a transversely oval rugose excavation 

 extending from the front margin to the middle or beyond it and 

 bounded by a smooth carina with a slight projection behind. 

 There is an elongate depression outside the carina on each side, 

 and another in each front angle. All these depressions are rugose, 

 and the remaining surface is smooth, shining and minutely 

 punctured. The scutellum is rugose, with a smooth outer margin, 

 and the elytra are moderately punctured, the punctures being 

 annular and some of them forming inconspicuous double rows ; 

 the apical margins are densely punctured. The propygidium is 

 scarcely produced and the stridulatory ridges are not very fine. 



