186 



pJiorus palmarum is also mentioned as injuring the cane in the same lo- 

 cality. 



We succeeded later in rearing the adult beetle, but failing, with the 

 literature at our command, to recognize it among the vast number 



of described species, we 

 sent a specimen to Dr. 

 David Sharp, of England, 

 who kindly gave us the fol- 

 lowing references quoted 

 from the "Memoirs on the 

 Coleoptera of the Hawaiian 

 Islands," by T. Blackburn 

 and D. Sharp,* a work 

 which we could not con- 

 sult: 



Genus CXXVI. Sphenophorus 

 Mun. Cat., VIII, p. 2646. 360. 

 Calandra obacura, Boisd. Voy. 

 Astr. II, p. 448. Fairm. Eev. 

 Zool., 1849, p. 474. 



Iu8. Oabn. Introduced. Ta- 

 hiti, New Ireland. In the stems 

 of banana, on the mountains. 

 This insect is apparently omitted 

 in the Munich Catalogue of 

 Coleoptera. 



Dr. Sharp further wrote that his original Identification of the species 

 was made from Boisduval's deficient description and from Fairmaire's 

 paper, and from a specimen so named by Jekel, in the British Museum 

 collection. After receiving our specimen (which was a male, while the 

 Jekel specimen was a female) Dr. Sharp found both sexes of the same 

 spei:ies among som e specimens recently sent him from Tahiti by Mr. J. J. 

 Walker, who found them under the bark of a species of il/?/srt (Banana). 



The species belongs to Schoenherr's and Lacordaire's genus Spheno- 

 phorus, and should be included in the group having the third tarsal 

 joint large and pubescent beneath. The disintegration of this large 

 genus, already indicated by Schoenherr and more strongly advocated 

 by Lacordaire has been accomplished in more recent times by Dr. Horn, 

 Dr. Le Conte, Mr. Pascoe, and especially by Mr. Chevrolat. The work 

 of the latter author (published in the Ann. de la Soc. Ent. de France, 

 1882 and 1885, partly after Chevrolat's death, the whole being evidently 

 incomplete and unfinished) is of such unsatisfactory and unsystematic 

 character that the generic determination of a single species is next to 

 impossible without having access to the types. 



Although we can not place our species in any of the numerous genera 

 erected by Chevrolat at the expense of the old genus Sphenophorus, it 



Fig. 44.— SPHENOPnoKus obscukus. a, adult, enlarged; b, 

 head of adult, from side, still more enlarged; c. full-grown 

 larva, from side ; d, pupa, ventral view, both enlarged 

 (original). 



•Published ia Trans. Koyal Dublin Soc. (2) III, 1885, pp. 119-300. 



