66 Mr. T. V. WoUaston's Revision of 



adhered to, species which are intimately related would be placed 

 asunder ; though more especially from the conviction that the 

 relative distance between the antennas and eyes is a character of 

 such doubtful importance in the Atomarice, and moreover so 

 difficult of observation (except in a very few and well-marked 

 cases) in objects thus small, as to be practically worthless. If, 

 however, we bear in mind the close affinity of certain members to 

 the Cryptophagi, and of others to the Ephistemi, we shall at once 

 acknowledge the propriety of commencing the genus with such 

 an insect as the A.Jerruginea (which, in general aspect and habit, 

 is almost a Cryptophagus in miniature), and of ending it with 

 the Ephiste7r,us-Vike versicolor : and so, having once settled our 

 extremes, it becomes a comparatively easy task to fill in the 

 means. 



With these few remarks, I will proceed to the consideration of 

 the species themselves, — merely observing that the three loose and 

 general divisions into which 1 have distributed them are more 

 likely, I think, to be found in accordance with Nature, and there- 

 fore to be easily understood, than if they had depended on one or 

 two minute characters, of which a slightly greater or less antennal 

 approximation (often difficult to appreciate even beneath the 

 microscope) formed the main element. 



S. I. Body with sides more or less parallel; prothorax behind 

 usually truncated and more or less distinctly margined. 



Sp. 1, Atomaria ferruginea. 



Cryptopliagus fernigineus, Sahl., Ins. Fenn. i. p. 58. 

 Atomaria pallida, VVoll., Ann. and Mag. of Nat. Hist, xviii. 

 p. 452, pi. 9, fig. 1 (1847). 



ferruginea, Erich., Nat. der Ins. Deuts. iii. p. 377 



(1848). 

 At once known by its uniform testaceous hue ; subdepressed, 

 pubescent surface ; and by the ninth joint of its (rather long and 

 robust) antennae being so far reduced in dimensions as to cause 

 the club to appear scarcely more than biarticulate. Its prothorax 

 is less truncated behind than is the case with the other members of 

 this division of the genus, — being somewhat posteriorly-produced 

 in front of the scutellum. It is apparently extremely rare, the 

 only British examples which I have seen, except the four which 

 I myself possess, being in the collection of the Rev. Hamlet 

 Clark. His specimens, together with three of my own, were 

 captured at Fulbourn, near Cambridge, in 1847 ; and one I took 



