812 



HYL.EUS-HYLURGUS. 



They usually remain quiet at the bottom, or buried 

 in the sand, during the day ; but at night they come 

 to the banks, and attack land animals, and even human 

 beings when they resort to the waters for the purpose 

 of bathing, washing, and cooling themselves. Their 

 characters are : a row of scales along the belly, larger 

 than those on the rest of the body ; the head small, 

 obtuse, and furnished with large plates. There are 

 many species of them, some poisonous and others 

 not ; but the whole of them are to be regarded with 

 suspicion. The body is compressed in the posterior 

 part, and well adapted for making way through the 

 water. 



Pelamis. These have the head- covered with large 

 plates as in the former subgenus ; but they differ 

 from it in having the occiput tumified in consequence 

 of the length of the pedicles of the lower jaw, which 

 allow a very large opening to the mouth, something 

 in the manner of the pythons, boas, and other large 

 serpents which kill their prey by crushing it. All 

 the scales on the body are nearly equal in size, and 

 they are arranged like a sort of pavement. The 

 greater number of them are found in the tropical and 

 southern Pacific, in many parts of which they are 

 very abundant, and grow to a large size. The natives 

 of some of the islands in that sea eat their flesh when 

 they can capture them. 



Chersydus have the scales upon the head and body 

 nearly of the same size, without any large plates 

 upon the head. They are chiefly found in the seas 

 and rivers of Java, where some of them are possessed 

 of very deadly poison. By some writers they have 

 been confounded with serpents which are perfectly 

 harmless, as well as singular ; and those mistakes are 

 the more to be regretted, when a perfectly harmless 

 animal is confounded with one whose powers of doing 

 mischief are very great. Thus Aular ccerrau of the 

 Javise, Acrochordus Javanensis, or wartv serpent, is 

 not only not poisonous, but a vegetable feeder; while 

 the Aular limpe, which is the banded Acrochordus of 

 some authors, is perhaps the most poisonous serpent 

 that inhabits the water. The history of the whole 

 race is imperfect however ; and, from the difficulty 

 of obtaining information, it is not easily rectified. 



HYL^EUS (Fabricius). A genus of short-tongued 

 bees (ANDRENID*:), which see for its characters. 



HYLOBIUS(Germar). A very destructive genus of 

 coleopterous insects belonging to the section Tetramera 

 and family CurcuKonidts, having the antennae twelve- 

 jointed, the rostrum moderately long, somewhat round- 

 ed with a lateral impression extending from the middle 

 of the eyes ; the elytra, which are not united together, 

 are of an oblong-ovate form, and the body is furnished 

 with wings ; the legs are moderately short and thick, 

 and the femora are armed with a spine. There are 

 several species, one only of which has fortunately 

 occurred in any abundance in this country. This is 

 the Curculio Metis, Linnaeus, a species varying from 

 five to nine lines in length, of a pitchy black colour, 

 with numerous yellow spots on the elytra. This 

 insect has rarely occurred in England, but in Scotland 

 it has been found in great quantities in the fir planta- 

 tions, in which it makes great devastation, as appears 

 from a letter from J. Loch, Esq., agent for the estates 

 of the Marquis of Stafford and Earl of Carlisle, dated 

 August 29, 1824, and addressed to Mr. W. S. Mac- 

 Leay, by whom it was published in the fourth number 

 of the Zoological Journal : " There has been lately 

 a great failure of the young firs and larches on Lord 



Carlisle's estates here. It was at first thought to be 

 occasioned by mice, so completely was the bark de- 

 stroyed. The wood-warden is now, however, per- 

 suaded that the mischief is done by the insects inclosed 

 in the box sent along with this. The destruction is 

 more rapid where the roots of the Scotch fir are in a 

 state of decay." Mr. Mac Leay then proceeds 

 " This last remark indeed goes of itself far to prove 

 that the author of the mischief is an insect, for mice 

 would only attack the green and healthy bark ; and to 

 set the question at rest, the insect of which many 

 specimens were sent, proved to be no other than the 

 Hylobius abietis of Gertnar (Curculio pini of the Ento- 

 mologia Brittanica), an insect most destructive to firs. 

 It is very common in the pine forests of Sweden and 

 Scotland, but in England I believe it has only as yet 

 been found in Cumberland and Shropshire." Mr. 

 MacLeay then gives the synonymy of the insect, 

 which Linnaeus named Curculio pini as well as C. abietis, 

 observing that it inhabits the Pinus sylvestris, and de- 

 vours its resin ; and then, in his peculiar style, he 

 proceeds to describe its manners as follows : " Tarde 

 incedit, arete apprehendit, tenaciter adhaeret, ore frus- 

 tra cutem mordere tentat captivus." Beyond these 

 observation little is known of the economy of this 

 destructive insect, and it is therefore impossible to 

 point out a remedy for the evil until we nave more 

 detailed accounts of the method in which the trees 

 are attacked. The naturalists in the north might, 

 however, easily acquire some insight into the history 

 of the insect, by examining the fir trees in Rivelston 

 Wood, near Edinburgh, where it was first discovered 

 during the winter season, and watching the larvae 

 until they make their appearance as perfect insects. 



HYLURGUS (Latreille). A genus of coleopter- 

 ous insects belonging to the section Tetramera, and 

 family Scolytidce (or BOSTRICHID^E, which see), having 

 the elytra rounded at the tips, the thorax not hooded, 

 the club of the antennae sub-globose, and the body 

 cylindrical. These are small beetles of very destruc- 

 tive habits, the type of which (Dermestesjnniperdus, 

 Linnaeus) is figured in our first volume, p. 670, col. 2, 

 where fig. 3 represents the insect of the natural size, 

 fig. 4 ditto magnified, fig. 5 the larva or maggot, and 

 fig. 6 the pupa (the figures 1 and 2, of which the 

 names were accidentally omitted, represent the typo- 

 grapher beetle of the natural size and magnified, of 

 whose proceedings an account is given in the preced- 

 ing page). The pine Hylurgus is extremely injurious 

 to young pines, by destroying the leading shoots. 

 The following observations respecting it were made 

 by Professor Lindley, and communicated to Mr. 

 Curtis, with drawings of the sections of the sterns 

 shewing the course of the tracks of the beetle : 

 " For the purpose of examining its proceedings more 

 narrowly, I placed a shoot of the Scotch fir under a- 

 glass with the insect. In about three hours after, it 

 had just begun to pierce the bark at the base of one 

 of the leaves ; its mandibles seemed chiefly employed, 

 its legs being merely used as a means of fixing itself 

 more firmly. Four hours after, its head and thorax 

 were completely buried in the shoot, and it had thrown 

 out a quantity of wood which it had reduced to a 

 powder, and which nearly covered the bottom of the 

 glass. In sixteen hours more it was entirely concealed, 

 and was beginning to form its perpendicular excava- 

 tion, and was busily employed in throwing back the 

 wood as it proceeded in destroying it ; there were 

 evidently two kinds of this saw-dust, part consisting 



