142 Schiodte's Specimen 



systematic characters, in order to settle its natural place. The 

 connate swollen and bladder-formed elytra form a curious con- 

 trast with the blind, long, narrow and depressed head and the 

 equally long, narrow, almost cylindrical prothorax, and the strange- 

 ness of the figure is rendered still more complete by the slender 

 and elongated shape of the limbs. However, a combination of the 

 following characters will only admit of the animal being com- 

 pared with Silphidce, Anisotomidce and Scydmcenidce. Seven ab- 

 dominal joints ; the first being hidden by the hind hips ; only the 

 last two completely movable. Fore coxae conical, freely projecting 

 from their articulating cavities. Antennae 11-jointed, clavate. 



This last-mentioned family has been adopted by a number of 

 authors since the time of Latreille, but remains still without being 

 properly confirmed. I have in a former memoir* endeavoured 

 to show that it recedes from the rest of Latreille's Clavicorns by 

 its anatomical character, and therefore confine myself at present 

 to the following observations. 



The parts of the mouth are formed according to a peculiar 

 type, approaching to no other than that of the Pselaphidce. The 

 upper lip wants the labellum, but is furnished with spines ; the 

 mandibles are falcate, with sharp teeth, the molar plate small, 

 slightly grooved ; maxillae short, with broad stems and palpi, with 

 extraordinarily large joints ; the terminal part of the external 

 maxillary lobe is quite horny, except along the inner suture. On 

 account of the greater development of the divisions of the maxillae, 

 the faucal margin becomes deeply excavated on each side of the 

 mentum, which is very small, and is thus supported by a more or 

 less protruding part of the throat. The scapes of the labial palpi, 

 which in the Silphidce and Anisotomidce are nearly concealed by the 

 mentum, are protruding, free and connate throughout their whole 

 length in the Scydmcenidce. The short tongue is quite horny, 

 with a spinose scarcely incised apex ; the paraglossae, on the 

 contrary, are much more developed than in the two families men- 

 tioned, free at the apex, and armed along the inner margin with a 

 row of pectinate teeth ; the middle joint of the lingual palpi is of 

 considerable size, intumescent, with a cuspidate terminal joint. 

 It is, therefore, principally the third pair of the parts of the mouth, 

 which presents itself by its form as the diagnosis ; and, in the se- 

 cond place, the form of the hinder hips, which are conical, and re- 

 moved from each other by the greater lateral development of the 

 metasternum. The congregated structure of the eyes, and the 



* Kriiyer, Naturhistorisk Tidsskrift, Ny Rjekke, B. 1, p. 394. 



