1907.] Catalogue of the Coleoptera of South Africa. 541 



to it a short, longitudinal elevation which can hardly be called a 

 costule ; the whole surface is deeply and somewhat broadly 

 punctate, the punctures separated from each other by a space wider 

 than their own diameter ; pygidium aciculate punctate ; abdomen 

 impunctate ; pectus and legs conspicuously plicate. 



Length 18-19 mm. ; width 10 mm. 



Hab. Transvaal (Eustenburg, Pretoria, Lydenburg, Potchef- 

 stroom, Upper Limpopo), Southern Ehodesia (Salisbury, Bulawayo, 

 Umcheki Kiv.). 



Gen. SCAPTOBIUS, Schaum., 

 Germar's Zeitschr., hi., 1841, p. 260. 



Mentum transverse, very large, obturating completely the mouth, 

 parallel laterally, slightly sinuate on each side of the anterior margin, 

 the base is sharply angular laterally and prolonged in the centre in 

 a triangular spine-like process, fitting against the base of the coxaa, 

 the insertion of the palps is in the inner side, close to the base of 

 the mentum, the two basal joints seemed fused together, the apical 

 one is swollen at the base sharply acuminate, and fits against the 

 sides, the maxillas are somewhat robust, the inner lobe is strougly 

 and sharply carinate longitudinally on the outer face, sharp and 

 hamate at tip, the upper lobe is armed with a very long tooth curved 

 at the tip, and the inner part is very little pubescent ; head convex, 

 or tuberculate, clypeus quadrate, with the anterior angles moderately 

 rounded and the anterior margin only slightly reflexed ; prothorax 

 ampliate rounded laterally in the anterior part, more attenuate in the 

 posterior, deeply incised, and with the upper angle sharp above the 

 base which is straight with the angles moderately rounded ; elytra 

 oblong-quadrate, plane, more or less plainly costate ; spiracles of the 

 propygidium sharply tuberculate ; pygidium vertical ; intermediate 

 coxaB divided by a very narrow space, prosternum without an acute 

 coxal process ; anterior tibiae tri-dentate outwardly ; intermediate 

 and posterior with a spine on the upper side ; anterior tarsi 4- or 

 5-jointed, the joints of all the tarsi somewhat swollen at apex. 



The insects included in this genus do not seem to have been met 

 with beyond the South African area ; they are found crawling on the 

 veld after rains, or under stones with ants ; they are then covered 

 with mud. One of them, .S'. capensis, has been met twice to my 

 knowledge in the formicarium of Plagiolepis custodiens, Sm. ; and 

 Guienzius states that he discovered S. aciculatus in a similar place, 

 but in company with Paussus cucullatus. This Paussus, however, 

 is not usually found with Plagiolepis custodiens, but with Pheidole 

 punctulata, a very different species of ant. 



