32 



Genus. — Plochionus, Dejean. 



Plo. amandtis. Laete ferrugineus ; caput et antennae ferruginea, 

 oculis nigris : prothorax ferrugineus transverse mgatus : elytra 

 profunde 9-striata, ferruginea, sutura fasciaque postica late ni- 

 gris, abdomen subtus ferrugineum : pedes pallidiores. (Corp. 

 long. '3 unc. lat. "IS unc.) 



Inhabits North America. In the cabinet of the Entomological 

 Club : it was taken in abundance by Messrs. R. Foster and E. Dou- 

 bleday, at St. John's Bluff, in East Florida. 



The colour of the insect is a bright ferruginous red, with the ex- 

 ception of the black eyes and the black cruciform mark on the elytra; 

 this is very wide at the base, nearly reaching from shoulder to shoulder : 

 towards the middle of the elytra it is nan-ower,and then suddenly widens, 

 spreading on each side to the margin, and extending along the mar- 

 gin upwards and downwards ; the margin itself is feiTuginous. Mr. 

 E. Doubleday has obligingly furnished me with the following particu- 

 lars of the economy of this beautiful little Carabite. 



" I first found it at Jacksonville, in East Florida, in December, 

 1837, on the dwarf palmetto. The leaves of this plant are eaten by a 

 small Tineite, which pares the upper surface of the leaves, and covers 

 the part so pared with a stout silken web. The larva of the Tineite 

 appears gregarious, as I found several empty pupa-cases together. In 

 the same hammock all the bushes of the American olive, and some of 

 the red bays, had the ends of the shoots spun together in the same 

 manner as the Yponomeutidae serve the Euonymi in this country. — 

 The majority of the specimens of Plochionus were taken in these 

 webs ; and as I never found any elsewhere, with the exception of those 

 on the dwarf palmetto, I presume their object in seeking the webs was 

 to prey on the pupae of the Tineites. The moth I have never seen, 

 and the beetle only at Jacksonville, and chiefly on the east side of the 

 town, where the olive-leaves were much spun together." 



JOHN VAN VOORST, '^^$:#Ecri^S>^ PATERNOSTER ROW. 



