4:2Q Mr. G. J. Arrow on the 



Genus Dermestes. 



The types of various so-called species in the British Museum 

 and the Oxford University Museum have never hitherto 

 received any critical examination. That of D. roei, Hope, is 

 unfortunately not to be found at Oxford, but of the other two 

 described by Hope I have ascertained that D. elongatus 

 belongs to vii^jnmis, F., and D. polUnctus to frischt, Hugel. 



D. elongatus, Lee, is not, as suggested by Jayne, the same 

 as the European I), bicolor^ F., a much shorter insect. As 

 Leconte's name was preoccupied by Hope, I propose to call 

 the species 



Dermestes nidum (nom. nov.), 



Mr. H. S. Barber having recorded (Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash- 

 ington, xxvii. 1914, p. 146) the fact that it breeds in the 

 nests of a heron. 



D. felinus, F., of which the type is in the British Museum, 

 is Dermestes cadaverinus, as is also D. subcostatus, Murray. 

 D. tessellatus, F., although it has not yet been eliminated 

 tiom the catalogues, was found long ago to be an Anohium 

 [rvfovillosiim, Deg.). 



The North- American D. dissector^ Kirby, belongs to the 

 European species D. undulatus, Brahm, and the Central- 

 American specimens referred by Sharp in the ' Biologia 

 Centiali-Anuricana ' to D. mayinerheimi are in reality 

 D. canimts, Germ., of which we have specimens also from 

 Panama, Cuba, and St. Domingo. 



Genus Attagenus. 



Many Dermestida?, as is well known, have an exceedingly 

 wide area of distribution, and are at the same time extra- 

 ordinarily variable in their more superficial features. The 

 synonymy due to this fact has by no means all been recorded 

 yet. One of these cosmopolitan species is that named 

 yHJthn'ostoma undulata by Motschulsky. This proves to be 

 the same as the Australian Brachysjyhyrus irroratus oi Black- 

 burn, the type of which (now in the British Museum) is a 

 female. Blackburn^s names must both disappear accordingly. 

 Another synonym for the same insect is Attagenus rujipes^ 

 Walker. Tiie name u3^thriostoma is also redundant, for it 

 cannot be distinguished generically from the species of 

 Telopes, which is at present treated as a subgenus of Atta- 

 genus. A. undulatus is evidently a common insect ; I have 

 seen specimens from Ceylon, India, Singapore, Hongkong, 



