86 Mr. A. Murray on Culeoptera from Old Calabar. 



impunctate ; the elytra above the truncature terminating in 

 three pi'ojecting teeth (the two outermost projecting furthest, 

 and the outermost the smallest) ; there are faint traces of three 

 raised lines or costse, of which these teeth are the terminations ; 

 the raised reticulations have in some specimens one more deve- 

 loped than usual, like a varicose vein, running transversely from 

 the suture at about one-third of the length of the elytra from the 

 apex. The outer margin has a row of punctures marked off by 

 a slightly raised straight line, within which at the anterior part 

 are two rows of punctures enclosed by an oblique line. Under- 

 side piceous. Metathorax fulvo-pilose. Tibiae finely externally 

 toothed, especially near the apex. 



This I believe to be the A. muricata of Fabricius. Some ento- 

 mologists on the continent still apply that name to it, doubtless 

 from tradition. There is also a specimen in the Fabrician 

 collection, now in the British Museum, bearing this name. 



The continental entomologists generally, however, consider it 

 synonymous with A. terebrans, Oliv. ; and Lacordaire (Gen. 

 Col. iv. p. 538) so records it ; but I am convinced that this is 

 an error, and a strong proof that it is so is that A. terebrans 

 is found both in Brazil and Africa, while muricata is confined 

 to Africa. Its appearance, too, is so different that one can 

 only account for its ever being considered the same by the 

 difficulty of putting the differences into words, and the ease 

 with which a little exaggeration of the characters of terebrans 

 would turn it into muricata. 



It is of the same size as terebrans, only broader and not quite 

 so long, giving the effect of a more bulky insect. The thorax 

 is decidedly broader in front, instead of being narrower as in A. 

 terebrans. It is deep black, with much deeper reticulations on 

 the elytra, leaving more open raised spaces, which are more 

 shining and glittering. The apical truncature is more vertical. 



The descriptions do not help us in the least, that of Olivier's 

 terebrans and Fabricius's muricata being totidem verbis the same 

 for both. Lacordaire makes the suggestion that the tuft of hair 

 on the forehead may be a sexual difference, in which case the 

 present species might be a sex of terebrans : it has not the tuft, 

 nor the projecting teeth, and it has an additional and a curved 

 development of the small most advanced teeth on the thorax — 

 both corresponding to a sexual difference which, I think, occurs 

 in another (smaller) species, A. monacha; but in it the reticula- 

 tions are the same in both, which is not the case here; and, be- 

 sides, as already said, all idea of this being a sex of terebrans is 

 excluded by the fact of the one, and not the other, being found 

 in South America. 



Not common in Old Calabar. It extends to Natal. 



