6 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 
rotten wood underneath should be carefully passed through a 
sieve, and the whole results stored in bags for examination at 
home; rare Muplecti, such as EH. punctatus and I. nigricans, 
good Scydmem, Batrisus, T'richonyx, very rare species of Ptinella 
and T'richopteryx, besides the best of the Lathridii, may be 
obtained or bred out by this method ; in fact, any one interested 
in the minuter species will find this plan, which Mr. Matthews 
pointed out to me, one of the best possible, if only the standing 
rotten trees can be found. 
Another class of beetles live in the same trees as those just 
mentioned, but they prefer the dampest spots, where the soft 
wood has been thoroughly soaked with moisture ; in such places 
T have found Paromalus and Abreus, and Baptolinus and species 
of Conurus are sometimes very abundant. In this connection 
we may mention the Phlwophagi, but these seem to like rather 
high-flavoured wood; P. eneopiceus affecting old damp wine 
casks, and P. spadix rotten stumps near high-water mark that 
have become thoroughly soaked with salt water. 
Other beetles, again, live between the bark and the wood for 
the most part (sometimes in the bark itself), but, as their form 
is cylindrical, they have to make galleries in order to give them- 
selves space to move about in; everyone almost is acquainted 
with the galleries of Hylesinus fraxim, but there are other 
beetles which have even obtained their names from a similar 
habit, as Tomicus stenographus, T. typographus, T. dryographus, 
Pityophthorus micrographus, &e. 
Some beetles bore into solid wood ; of these Platypus cylindrus 
is one of the most curious, although it is not in nearly as much 
request as its rare parasites, Colydiwm elongatwm and Oxylemus 
cylindricus, which are found occasionally in its burrows in the 
New Forest; J'rypodendron, Phlwotrya, Melasis, and others also 
bore into solid wood. I have taken T’rypodendron domesticum 
and 7’. quercus by stripping off the thick bark of a fallen tree in 
Sherwood Forest, and poking the insects out of their bores with 
straws or small twigs: this is the best way of procuring them, 
if practicable, but the bark must be taken off quickly and care- 
fully, or else they retire into their burrows in the solid tree, and 
eannot be reached. It is the larve, as a rule, of the wood- 
boring beetles that do so much damage by boring inte the 
trunks ; the larva of Scolytus destructor causes great destruction 
