250 The late Mr. F. Bates's Revision 



As second to this in value he gives the relatively smaller 

 and wider scutellum, usually more or less rounded behind. 

 On the other side he separates it from his " Areodides " by 

 the clypeus being confounded with the front. Singularly 

 enough he has included the genera Hctcrostcrnus and 

 Macropoidcs in his " Felidnotidcs," notwithstanding the fact 

 that both these genera have the clypeus distinctly separ- 

 ated from the Iront by a well-marked suture. These, 

 together with the genus Parisolca (unknown to Lacordaire), 

 were erected into a new sub-family — the Hdcrosterninn' — 

 by H. W. Bates in the " Biologia Cent. Amer., Lamclli- 

 cornia" p. 286, on account of the clypeus, which differs 

 from that of the " Butclidcs vraies " in being well separated 

 from the front, and of the "Areodides" in being quite 

 differently formed. Dr. Ohaus has confirmed this arrange- 

 ment in his " Revision der Heterosterniden," and has 

 enriched it by his new genus Komoiostcrmcs. This and 

 Hctcrostemus have the base of the thorax fully margined 

 in the $, the margin sometimes effaced at the middle — in 

 front of the scutellum — in the ^ : in the genera Parisolca 

 and MacrojJoides the base of the thorax is completely 

 immarginate. It is much more difficult to find characters 

 that will enable one at once to distinguish the " Pdidno- 

 tides " from those " Rutelidcs vraies " having the tarsal 

 claws all entire, for there is no single character sufficiently 

 constant to enable us to do this : nevertheless we shall 

 not go far wrong if we attend to the following characters 

 in combination. In the " Butelides vraies" the scutellum 

 is larger, and longer than wide * ; the base of the thorax 

 is always immarginate, and more or less parabolically 

 emarginate from the median lobe to the hind angles, the 

 median lobe being arcuately emarginate, or truncate, in 

 front of the scutellum : and the mesosternal process is 

 massive and frequently elongated. 



In the PclidnotincV the scutellum is generally rather 



* The only exceptions known to nie are the species cxrulea Ferty, 

 and lauta Buna, of Bunneister's genns CJialcentis ; in which the 

 scutenum — although qnite disproportionately large — is very distinctly 

 wider than long, with the apex either pointed or narrowly rounded. 

 As Lacordaire has pointed out, these two species are generically 

 distinct from the third species — victhna Bitrm. — included by Bur- 

 meister in the gemis. As this latter species forms the first division 

 of the gentis, it must, I presume, take the generic title of Chalcentis : 

 in which case I propose the generic title of Microrntela for the other 

 two. 



