THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 9 



Prosternum excavated. - - Byesopidjs. 



Gular margin not prominent; mentum 

 large, concealing the mandibles, 

 which are not scarred at the tip. Bbachycerid^ 

 b. Tarsi dilated, usually with a brush of 

 hair beneath. 

 Mandibles with deciduous tip, leaving 



a scar. - . . . Otioehynohid^. 



Mandibles simple, usually pincer- 



shaped. ... - Cueculionid^. 



B. Antennae with eleven separate joints. - BEENTHiDiE. 



Concerning Araycteridae and Brachycevidae but little need 

 be said : they are very peculiar and easily-recognized forms, 

 not represented in our Fauna. 



The first is Australian : the antennae are slender and 

 geniculated ; the beak short and stout, deeply ernarginate 

 at tip, alike in both sexes ; the buccal opening is very 

 large, and the cavity is filled almost completely by the 

 mandibles, which are convex, hairy on the greater part of the 

 front surface, deflexed, deeply concave beneath ; the gular 

 margin is thickened and prominent, so that a deep cavity is 

 seen between the gula and the mandibles, in which the 

 mentum and oral organs are concealed from view; the eyes 

 are small, and nearly round in some, narrowed beneath in 

 others; the front coxae are contiguous; the prosternum very 

 short ; the elytra are connate, and extend far over the flanks, 

 so that the side pieces — both of the mesothorax and meta- 

 thorax — are concealed; the dorsal segments of the abdomen 

 are membranous, except the last, which is very large, 

 corneous, and convex, more so in the male than in the 

 female, — in the former it is truncate behind, exposing a 

 semicircular 8lh segment, from under which protrudes 

 (Psalidura) a very powerful and complex genital armature, 

 consisting of a large pair of forceps, conical -obtuse, 

 punctured, and hairy, under which, and seen only from 

 below% is a pair of transverse, thin, polished, corneous plates, 

 also meeting on the median line; between them and the 

 forceps is a large deep cavity ; the ventral segments are 

 scarcely less singular; the 1st and 2nd segments large, flat, 

 connate, united by a sinuate suture ; 3rd and 4th very short, 

 separated by deeply-excavated straight sutures; 5th much 



c 



