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X. Description of Two Insects helovging to Pseudomela, 

 a New Genus o/Chrysomelidae. By Joseph S. Baly, 

 Esq. 



[Read 3rd March, 1856.] 



The following genus bears, in its vertical and deeply inserted 

 head, a striking resemblance to Eumolpus, near which it was 

 placed in my cabinet, until a closer examination showed me that 

 its true relations were with the Chrysomelidce proper ; the perpen- 

 dicular or horizontal positions of the head, so well marked in the 

 typical genera Eumolpus and Chrysomela, are of much less value 

 in the aberrant forms of the two families, and not of themselves 

 suflicient to separate them, without having recourse to other 

 characters. Lacordairc, in the introductory chapter to his Mo- 

 nograph on the Phytophages, points out the characters to be 

 derived from the tarsi ; in the separation of the present 

 families they are most important ; the Eiimolpidce have the 

 third joint invariably deeply cleft or bilobed, and the fourth, 

 or claw, more or less toothed. The Chrysomelidce, on the other 

 hand, have their penultimate joint entire, Gastrophysa and Phra- 

 tora, genera allied to the Halticidce, alone excepted ; their claw 

 again is generally simple, although the exceptions to this latter rule 

 are numerous. The two species described in the present paper 

 are both from Africa; one received from Old Calabar by A. Murray, 

 Esq., of Edinburgh, after whom I have named it, the other from 

 Port Natal, sent by Mr. Plant. 



Family CHRYSOMELIDCE. 

 Genus PSEUDOMELA. 



Anlenncs robust, flattened, subclavate, rather longer than the 

 thorax, their first joint incrassate, clavate, the second short, the 

 third and fourth equal, ovate, slightly thickened towards the apex, 

 the rest dilated, compressed, covered with short hairs. Palpi 

 clavate, truncate, the third joint rather broader than the fourth. 

 Body ovate, convex ; head perpendicular, deeply inserted in the 

 thorax, th6 latter transverse; legs and tarsi simple, the latter with 

 their penultimate joint entire. 



