24 HETEROMERA. [ Helopina. 
anterior and intermediate pairs in the male being usually dilated ; the 
legs, as a whole, are rather long, and the femora extend considerably 
beyond the sides of the body. 
HELOPS, Fabricius. 
In this genus the antenne are long and rather slender, and the 
maxillary palpi have the last joint dilated and securiform ; the third 
joint of the antenne is four or five times longer than the second, and 
the penultimate joints are always longer than broad ; the eyes are trans- 
verse and slightly emarginate ; the thorax is transverse or subtransverse, 
almost truncate in front and behind, more or less strongly margined ; 
the tibie are rather slender, but are gradually widened to apex, and 
have the apical spurs small or very small ; the genus is allied to Tenebrio, 
but differs in its short metasternum, long antenne, less elongate and 
more oval elytra, and other characters ; it is very extensive in point of 
numbers, containing upwards of two hundred and fifty or three hundred 
species, of which about one hundred and twenty (if we include the sub- 
genera) are found in Europe, and the remainder are widely distributed 
in Northern and Central Asia and Ceylon, Northern Africa and the 
Gaboon district, Cuba, the Australian region, &c. ; only a few species, 
however, appear to have been met with in tropical countries. 
The larva of H. ceruleus is described and figured by Schiédte (1.c. p. 571, pl. xi. 
fig. 15), and also by Westwood (Classification, i. p. 312, fig. 86, 20); it is 
found in the rotten wood of chestnut and other trees, and is elongate, linear and 
cylindrical, about ten times as long as broad, of a yellow colour with dark tuber- 
cles on the last abdominal segment; the prothorax is longer than broad, narrowed 
in front, and constricted before middle; the penultimate scgment is rugose and the 
terminal one short, and armed with two divergent erect and acute spines ;* the front 
pair of legs is longer than the intermediate and posterior pairs; Westwood records 
the fact of these larvae doing damage to a window frame in which they had taken 
up their abode. 
I. Last joint of antenne obliquely truncate; front con- 
siderably dilated before eyes; thorax strongly margined, 
with sides much rounded in front (Helops,i.sp.) . H. ceruevs, LD. 
II. Last joint of antenne rounded; front slightly dilated 
before eyes; thorax narrowly margined at sides, with 
sides not or not strongly rounded in front (s.g. Nalas- 
sus, Muls.). 
i. Colour pitchy brown ; thorax not sinuate before base . H.stTRiatus, Four. 
ii. Colour testaceous ; thorax slightly sinuate before base . H. PALLIDUS, Curt. 
H. coeruleus, L. A large and conspicuous species, broad and 
convex, nigro-cceruleus above, black beneath, moderately shining; head 
rugosely punctured, antenne moderately long and robust; thorax sub- 
quadrate in the male, evidently broader than long in the female, with 
coarse raised margins, and with the sides rounded in front and rather 
strongly narrowed behind, punctuation thick and strong, in parts sub- 
* This larva appears, if touched, to strike upwards or sideways with these spines ; 
they seem therefore to be, in part at least, weapons of defence. 
