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Notes on M. FauveVs observations on Amblyopinus Jansoni, 

 with a figure and full dissections o/" Amblvoi'inus Jelskii; by 

 the Eev. A. Matthews, M.A. 



It seems incomprehensible that any one, who had ever seen a 

 live Staphylinide, should suppose that figures representing the 

 dried up and contracted specimens usually found in cabinets, 

 especially on the continent, do in any respect portray the living 

 form of the insect, which, in fact, they absurdly caricature. It 

 does not require much observation to discover that each segment 

 of the abdomen exhibits at the base, and sometimes for nearly 

 half its length, a smooth and shining surface, equally devoid of 

 hair or sculpture, Avhile beyond this the remainder of the seg- 

 ment is punctured or otlierwise sculptured, and often ck>thed 

 with a more or less dense pubescence; nor does it require much 

 thought to comprehend that the glabrous portion of the segment 

 distinctly defines the distance by which the segments mutually 

 overlap each other, and that the true form of the abdomen 

 cannot possibly be ascertained until the segments have been 

 restored to their proper relative position. 



Nevertheless, on this very ground, in a late number of the 

 " Revue d'Entomologie " (vol. ii, pp. 39, &c.), M. Fauvel vio- 

 lently assails my figure of Ambl/jopinus Jansoni, published in the 

 Cist. Ent., vol. ii, pi. 6. Having, I suppose, formed his ideas of 

 the shape of this insect from a specimen which he received from 

 me, in the cramped and contracted condition in which it had been 

 transmitted to Mr. Janson, he asserts that my figure "does not 

 give the short and broad form of the insect ; " this is certainly 

 quite true, for this good reason, that the insect is long and com- 

 paratively narrow. He then says that I "have made the head 

 as long as the thorax," (this remark I shall have occasion to 

 notice farther on) and adds that "these two parts are the former 

 slightly and the latter strongly transverse." I know that they 

 appeared to be so in the specimen which I sent, but even if they 



