92 HETEROMERA. [ Xylophilus. 
X. oculatus, Gyll. (pygmeus, Muls., nec De G.). Head and 
thorax fuscous black, the latter sometimes brownish, elytra fusco-tes- 
taceous ; pubescence pale, fine and rather thin; punctuation close, more 
distinct on elytra than on thorax ; head together with eyes broader 
than front of thorax; eyes distinctly, but not deeply, emarginate ; 
thorax transverse, impressed on either side at base with a transverse, 
somewhat curved furrow ; elytra subparallel, rather plainly and rugosely, 
but very closely, sculptured; antenne and legs ferruginous or reddish- 
testaceous. L. 15-2 mm. 
Male with the antenne very long, longer than the whole body, with 
the third joint twice as long as second ; the anterior tibiz are terminated 
by a short hooked spine, and the posterior femora are somewhat 
thickened. 
Female with the antenne short, scarcely longer than half the body, 
with the third joint a little longer than second ; tibiz and femora simple. 
In decaying white-thorn, oak, willow, &c.; very local and, as a rule, rare; Lee 
(Douglas and Scott); Forest Hill; Woking ; Claygate, Esher, Horsell, Birch Wood 
and Purley (Power); Birch Wood (S. Stevens); Windsor and Suffolk (Stephens) ; 
Devon ; Sherwood Forest ; Dunham Park, Manchester (Chappell). 
MELOIDE (Cantharide). 
This family contains some of the most interesting and at the same 
time we may say the most useful of the Coleoptera; there is nothing 
hardly, more strange to be found in the history of insects than the 
transformations of Meloé and Sitaris, and medicine is much indebted to 
the genera Lytta (Cantharis) and Mylabris for their vesicatorial or 
blistering qualities, for which even in these days no effectual substitute 
appears yet to have been discovered ; the family is rather a large one, 
containing upwards of fifty genera and a thousand species, which are 
very widely distributed throughout the world, from Siberia to the Cape 
of Good Hope, India, Chili and Peru, and the Australian region ; the 
majority of species, however, occur in the tropics or the adjacent 
countries ; some of the genera are very extensive in point of numbers, 
Mylabris and Lytta (Cantharis) each containing between two and three 
hundred species ; there has been considerable confusion caused as to the 
nomenclature of the family by the fact that Linnzus applied the term 
Cantharis to Telephorus, although the name had been used for the 
blister beetle for a long time previously in medicine; several modern 
authors, moreover, apply the name Mylabris to Bruchus, and substitute 
Zonabris for Mylabris; it is perhaps the best course to adopt the term 
Meloide for the family instead of Cantharide, and to drop the term 
Cantharis altogether, but the change of name as regards Mylabris cannot 
without great difficulty and confusion be admitted. The members of 
the family Meloide differ considerably from one another in shape, colour, 
and general appearance; the following are the chief characters which 
they possess in common :—Head vertical, strongly and suddenly 
e 
