1902.] Catalogue of the Coleoptera of South Africa. 663 



at apex than at the base and reflexed at the tip in the male and the 

 female, but occasionally acuminate and move sharply dentate, and 

 more deeply emai'ginate at tip in the female (^vuljnna, vcst/ita, fallax) ; 

 prothorax rounded laterally, a little attenuated in the anterior part ; 

 scutellum triangular, longer than broad ; elytra plane, covering only 

 the edge of the propygidium ; pygidium vertical in the male, sloping 

 a little in the female ; all claws double with the exception of 

 E. stiymatica, in which the hind ones are single ; the inner claw is 

 robust and cleft at tip and the outer one is slender but nearly as long 

 as the outer and deeply cleft at tip in the anterior legs, while in the 

 intermediate and posterior ones the outer claw is robust, and the 

 inner very slender, both the hind ones are simple ; the body is 

 covered with sub-lanuginose and squamose yellow hairs and scales, 

 except E. vuljnna, and the hind tibise of the male are hardly thicker 

 than those of the female ; the apical inner spur of the anterior tibia is 

 only found in the species the maxillae of which are not pluridentate. 



In all the species but one, E. vulpina, which is a transition form 

 between Lepitrix and Eriesthis, the anterior part of the prothorax is 

 more or less densely hairy, but there is always a somewhat broad 

 basal margin of yellow scales and squamose hairs. 



The variation in the number of teeth in the maxilla, which might 

 in other cases be considered sufficiently important to form generic 

 sections, would in the case of Eriesthis be greatly misleading, 

 because, with the exception of E. vuljnna, all the species are plainly 

 closely allied and have a somewhat similar livery, which makes the 

 identification of the species a rather difficult task. 



The genus is South African, with one exception from German East 

 Africa, and is poorly represented in the South-Western and Western 

 part of Cape Colony, Calitzdorp being its most Western habitat, but 

 it has numerous representatives in the Eastern and South -Eastern 

 parts of the Colony, in Natal, and in the Transvaal. I have seen 

 an example alleged to have been collected on the Zambezi Kiver by 

 Dr. Bradshaw, but this habitat requires confirmation. 



Key to the Species. 



A3. Maxillae without tooth. 



Head, prothorax and elytra clothed with dense, erect, greyish hairs ; 

 elytra with interspersed and contiguous, thick, squamose fiavous 

 appressed hairs pustilla. 



A^. Maxillae with one basal tooth. 



Maxillae with a single basal tooth, body without scales ; elytra 

 testaceous ; covered with greyish and black hairs vtilpina. 



