262 
In Europe the genus Thamnurgus breeds in the stems of various 
species of Euphorbia, of Delphinium, Origanum and Teucrium, and 
according to Perris, the females do not burrow, but lay their eggs in 
wounds gnawed on the outside of the stem; in this genus the aspert- 
ties on the front of the prothorax have completely dissapeared. 
In Burma a species which I have identified as Platydactylus sex- 
spinosus Motsch (Ind. Mus. Notes, TI, 1, 64), injures rice by boring into 
the stalks, and has been known to destroy a field of an acre (loc. cét. I. 
1, 61). This attack on the thin stem of a cereal, a very different thing 
from that of Yyleborus perforans on the woody sugar-cane, is so remark. 
able, and the insect, common in collections from Ceylon and the Malay 
Archipelago, is of so singular a form, that it is to be regretted that ne 
further information has come to hand. The mode of larval life is 
unknown, and it is impossible to conjecture whether the larva is 
destructive or whether the beetle alone is responsible for the damagt 
and breeds in other material, as is the case with Myelophilus piniperd 
and its attacks on pine shoots. 
Two undescribed instances of depredations on soft tissues have com: 
under my notice. 
In the early part of this year IL received from Mr. C. A. Barbei 
superintendent of the botanical department of the Leeward Islands 
through Mr. T. D. A. Cockerell, specimens of a small Tomicine whie¢ 
had injured the young leaves of sugar-cane in Nevis, West Indies. 
Three beetles alone were sent, belonging to two species, and no sped 
imens of the injured leaves. : 
A demand for more material brought specimens of the leaves wit 
beetle-holes and burrows, and of the insects preserved in alcohol. 
The offender is Hypothenemus eruditus Westw. The examples sho 
certain differences from the type, but not of sufficient importance 1 
indicate a new species. The diversity of color is strongly marked, tk 
posterior part of the head, the prothorax, and limbs being testaceou 
the rest piceous; the prothorax is more convex, the disk less depress¢ 
on either side, its asperities few, very large, and piceous at the tip, tl 
anterior border with but four or five well-marked tubercles; the leng’ 
averages 1-4 mm. The color and sparse tuberculation of the thor 
give it a very different appearance to the unicolorous Hypothenem: 
aspericollis Woll, from the Canaries, which Dr. Sharp regards as tl 
same species, and in which the thoracic tubercles are numerous a 
smaller. But I agree with the latter and other zoologists as to 
variability, and it appears desirable that these separate forms shi 
not be regarded as specifically distinct unless they coexist in the sal 
country. 
Two structural points deserve notice. 
There is some doubt as to the number of joints in the antennal fw 
culus of H. eruditus. Westwood describes and figures three, indicati 
one suture in the distal division. Eichhoff, while admitting its possil}, 
‘ 
eda 
