365 



obtained, so far as I am aware, from the study of the immature 

 stages. Happily a series of specimens of Propomacrus bi- 

 mucronatus in all its stages exists in the British Museum. The 

 larva has the familiar strongly curved form and is rather less 

 elongated than those of the MELOLONTHIX^: and RUTELINJE 

 known to me, but more so than the larva of Cetonia. The legs, 

 while longer than those of the latter, are much shorter than 

 usual in the MELOLONTHINYE, and the antennae are also shorter, 

 but with the penultimate joint produced into a strong tooth. 

 The smooth terminal segment of the abdomen is about equal 

 in length to the two preceding ones and much shorter than 

 is usual, except in the CETONIINVE, but it is completely divided 

 by a transverse fold, instead of being entire, as specially cha- 

 racteristic of the latter group. (In the TKICHIINI, to which 

 Burmeister referred these insects, a fold is traceable dorsally, 

 but is not complete.) There is only a very thin clothing of 

 fine hair, but the corrugated dorsal segments bear fairly close-set 

 backwardly-directed spines. The ventral side of the last segment 

 has a bare median line, on each side of which is a broad patch of 

 evenly-distributed similar spines. The anal orifice is situated 

 dorsally and is longitudinal, with a broad triangular flap covering 

 its anterior end. The longitudinal position is exceptional, but 

 is perhaps a primitive character, being found in LucANiDjE, 

 PASSALID.E, TKOGIX^E, and, according to Ferris, in a genus of 

 MELOLONTHIN^E, viz. Triodonta. 



Bevond the facts that the larvae feed upon decaying wood 

 and the mature insects upon the sweet exudations from certain 

 trees, we know practically nothing as to the habits of the 

 EUCHIRIN^;. The onlv reference to those of an Indian species 

 is, I believe, in a letter, dated the 28th July, 1847, from 

 Capt. T. Hutton, of the East India Company, published in the 

 ' Transactions of the Entomological Society ' for that year. 

 According to this, Propomacrus macleayi breeds in decaving 

 oak trees (Qtiercus incana), arid the beetle is a sap-feeder " and 

 may be seen in company with crowds of stag-beetles sucking up 

 the juice as it flows from wounds in the trees." 



The cocoons of wood-fibre made by the larvae of this species 

 before pupation are depicted by M. Pouillaude in ' Insecta,' 1913, 

 fig. 3. Dr. Ohaus has recorded that a variety of the same 

 species inhabits Formosa, where its cocoons have been found in 

 a decaying camphor-tree (Ent. Eundsch. xxx, 1913, p. 142). 



P. bimucronatus has been observed at Constantinople breeding 

 in an oak, Herr Abresch having found beetles on the point of 

 emergence in the month of August in the rotten wood contained 

 in a hole about five feet from the base of the tree (Stett. Ent. 

 Z^it. 1851, p. 200). Dr. Heller found the same species in 

 Northern Syria in a very different tree, Cordia myxa, L., known 

 as " arbre a glu," because a kind of birdlime was prepared by 

 the Arab inhabitants from its fruit. This tree having been intro- 

 duced from regions farther East, Dr. Heller argues that the 



