43 



CHAPTEE IX. 



THE GEODEPHAGA, OR, LAND CARNIVOROUS 

 BEETLES. 



SECTION I. The ADEPHAGA possess an inner or 

 palpiform lobe to the maxillse, in addition to the four- 

 jointed maxillary palpi (Fig. 4, d l , p. 23), and are readily 

 separated into two subsections ; the first of which, the 

 GEODEPHAGA, contains terrestrial, and the second, the 

 HYDRADEPHAGA, aquatic species. 



Subsection 1. GEODEPHAGA, M'Leay. 



This subsection, although not employed in the most 

 recent Continental systems of classification (wherein its 

 families are not distinguished, as a group, from those of 

 the Hydradephaga, its aquatic representative), will be 

 retained in the present work, being generally used in 

 British catalogues, etc., and forming a natural division, 

 of which the members are readily separated from other 

 beetles. 



It consists, as the name imports, of the predaceous 

 ground-beetles, recognizable by their hard well-deve- 

 loped mandibles or jaws; their legs eminently con- 

 structed for rapid movement combined with strength, 

 and with all the tarsi five-jointed ; and by their antennae 



