200 CANARIAN COLEOPTERA. 



I have taken the 0. castanea near Orotava ; and it has likewise been 

 communieated by the Barao do Castello de Paiva from the vicinity of 

 Laguna. 



316. Ootoma obscurella, n. sp. 

 0. fere ut 0. castanea, sed ubique (snbtiis et supra) fusco-nigra, pube 



obsciiriore ; sutura frontali vix minus distinct;! ; scutello paulo 



densius pimctato ; pedibus piceis, tarsis clarioribus ; palp is an- 



tennisque rufo-testaceis, 

 Mas palporum maxillarium articnlo ultimo magno, lato et paulo lon- 



giore quam in 0. castanea. 

 Fcem. palporum maxillarium articulo ultimo subcylindrico-ovali 



(multo minus conico quam in 0. castanea). — Long. corp. Kn. 5-6. 



Habitat in Hierro, mense Februario a.d. 1858 duo specimina collegi. 



Were it not for the slight differences in the shape of the ultimate 

 joint of their respective maxillary palpi, I might perhaps have re- 

 garded the present Ootoma as a dark insular modification of the cas- 

 tanea, peculiar to Hierro ; but as I cannot suppose that those organs 

 would vary structurally in the same species, I am compelled to treat 

 the 0. obscurella as an additional member of this small geographical 

 assemblage. It may be known from the castanea by its uniformly 

 dark hue (both the under and upper surfaces being of a brownish- 

 black), by its obscurer pubescence, by its frontal suture being a little 

 less distinct, by its scutellum being apparently somewhat more thickly 

 punctured, and by the terminal articulation of its maxillary palpi 

 being (relatively) a trifle longer in the males and much less conical 

 (or more oblong) in the females. 



Judging from its colour alone, I should have had no hesitation in 

 referring this insect to the Melolontha obscura of Brulle ; but since 

 he mentions that that species has the last joint of its maU maxillary 

 palpi only very slightly wider than the preceding one (and the en- 

 larged antennal clava to which he alludes would seem to imply that 

 it cannot have been a female from which he drew up his diagnosis), 

 I am precluded altogether from acting on that supposition. The only 

 two examples which I have seen were taken by myself, in the island 

 of Hierro, during February 1858. 



317. Ootoma obscura. 



Melolontha obscura, Bmlle, in Wehh et Berth. ( Col.) 61. pi. 1. f. 2 (1838). 

 Ootoma obscura, Blanch., Cat. Col. Mas. de Paris, 120 (1850). 



Habitat? 



dilutior, tibiis anticis obsolete trifidis," and cites it as coming from 



" I'ile de Teneriffe," I think we may safely assign it to the 0. castanea (for it is 

 manifestly, as Lacordaire lias rightly conjectured, an Ootoma). 



