250 
Mr. J. O. Westwood on the 
viidce , giving its characters from Saint Fargeau, with a figure of 
the typical species. In a subsequent page (47), however, he in- 
troduced it, under the name of Lasiocera, into his synoptical table 
of his Tingidites ; and at page 50 he corrected the name to Ho- 
loptilus, and stated his conviction that it belonged to that group 
of Hemiptera. Lastly, Burmeister (Handbuch der Entomol., vol. ii. 
p. 248) gave a new description of the genus, retaining H. ursus 
as its type, but stating that a second species from Java was con- 
tained in the Royal Collection of Berlin. He placed the genus 
at the end of his family Ruduvini, immediately preceding the 
Membranacei of Latreille ( Cimex , Tingis, See.). 
Of the affinities of this genus, Messrs. St. Fargeau and Serville 
observe, that “ Les Holoptiles, par la masse de leurs caracteres, 
se rapprochent des Reduves, mais les antennes triarticulees, la 
nature homogene de leurs elytres, et l’absence des ailes, les en 
distinguent.” There is indeed some resemblance in the nature 
of the hemelytra of these insects and some of the Reduviidce, such 
as Enicocephalus, Westw., and Opisthoplatys, Westw. ; but in all 
the insects of the last-mentioned family which I have examined 
the intermediate joint of the rostrum is by far the largest. The 
tarsi in Reduvius are distinctly three-jointed,* the terminal joint not 
occupying more than half the tarsus, and (except in such genera as 
Ploiaria and Emesa ) the anterior tibiae are terminated by a brush or 
cushion-like plate, more or less developed, and which is even to 
be found in the Zell. The simple structure of the fore-legs, and 
the exposed rostrum, separate it from the Phymatites of Laporte, 
whilst the two-jointed tarsi and three-jointed rostrum separate it 
from Tingis, Sec., in which the tarsi are three-jointed and the 
rostrum four-jointed. The three-jointed tarsi separate it from 
Cimex, which have three-jointed tarsi, but in which the rostrum is 
three-jointed. In Aradus, however, the rostrum is three-jointed 
and the tarsi four-jointed, as in Holoptilus. We should therefore 
be induced to regard it as most nearly allied to this group, but 
the rostrum is exposed, that is, not received when at rest in a 
canal formed by elevated margins on the underside of the head, 
and the general appearance of the insects is far removed from 
Aradus. It will perhaps be the most natural course to regard it 
as an osculant genus intermediate between Reduvius and some of 
the Cimieidce. 
As to the geographical range of this little group, it appears to 
be very widely distributed. The Cape of Good Hope is the 
* This is the case with Lophocephalu of Laporte. See Burmeister, vol. ii. 
p. 244. 
