20 



ment of the species to be attributed to those sub-tribes respectively , 

 inasmuch as it renders necessary the removal of 3fcechidius from 

 the former to the latter and of Pachytricha and Phcenognatha 

 from the latter to the former. These transfers, however, appear 

 to me to tend altogether to a more natural classification. All 

 the three genera affected by it are extremely isolated in their 

 characters, and it is probably open to question whether each of 

 them may not eventually be regarded as representing a distinct 

 sub-tribe, but even so it seems to me that in a natural arrangement 

 the sub-tribes containing Phcenognatha and Pachytricha would 

 stand before the Sericides in the Melolonthini, and that containing- 

 Mcechidias certainly after the Sericoides. If the arrangement I 

 thus suggest be followed it will have the effect of associating 

 together in the Sericides species having remarkable sexual 

 characters in the front tarsi (unless Phcenognatha of which I 

 know only one sex be an exception) and in the Sericoides species 

 not exhibiting such sexual characters (or at least only in a slight 

 degree and in occasional members of a genus) and also of making 

 the Sericides of Australia consist entirely (unless Epholcis 

 Phcenognatha and Pachytricha, which I have not seen alive, be 

 exceptions) of genuinely flower-frequenting day-fliers, and the 

 Sericoides (so far as I know, and I have collected nearly all the 

 genera) contain no genus at all with similar habits ; for although 

 a few Heteronyces and Liparetri are sometimes to be met with 

 on flowers (as indeed what insect are not 1 I once found some 

 flowers thickly studded with a Hydrophilid) certainly neither 

 Liparetrus nor Heteronyx can be reckoned a flower-frequenting 

 genus. 



Since the publication of Lacordaire's volume dealing with the 

 Lamellicornes numerous Australian genera have been added, and 

 as their diagnoses are scattered over a wide field of literature it 

 seems desirable before passing to the description of some new 

 species that are before me to make some remarks on the aggre- 

 gates to which those new species are referable. I will begin 

 with the 



SERICIDES (sub-tribe). 



Excluding Mcechidius and including Pachytricha and 

 Phcenognatha (as proposed above), four genera known to 

 Lacordaire would form the Australian contingent of this sub- 

 tribe. To these five genera must now be added (including two 

 new ones described below and one formerly described under a 

 nom. prseocc). 

 A. Head (at any rate of the male) armed with a 



horn ... .-. ... .- Phmnognatha. 



AA, Head unarmed. 



B. Each claw bidentate beneath ... ... Pachytricha. 



BB. Claws not bidentate beneath. 



