The Beetles of the Mountains 



for rest and refreshment we must see what can be found 

 in the thick, wet, luxuriant moss which fills up all the 

 hollows and rock fissures on the northern ; that is, the 

 shady side of our peak, for it is in thick moss that 

 some of our choicest mountain species abide. 



The first difficulty will be to find a sufficiently flat 

 shelf, sheltered by the main peak from the wind, where 

 anchored by stones at the corners we can lay out our 

 sheet of brown paper and shake masses of this moss 

 over it. As we pull the bunch to pieces several small 

 species of Brachelytra ought to drop out and run across 

 the paper. Perhaps the first one we pick up may be 

 something very like one of those Lesteoce, which the 

 dripping moss out of the bed of the stream yielded us. 

 One might easily mistake it for L. sharpi for instance 

 about the same size and colour, and with similar rather 

 long antennae and elytra. It however really is included 

 in quite another genus, Geodromicus, and its name is 

 Geodromicus globulicollis (the Geodromicus with the 

 rounded thorax), Fig. 10, Plate VI. The difference 

 which separates these two genera, Lesteva and Geodrom- 

 icus is expressed by the relative lengths of the last 

 joint of the maxillary palpi, which in Lesteva is four 

 times as long as, but in Geodromicus hardly at all larger 

 than, the last j oint but one. 



There are two British species of this genus, G. globuli- 

 collis, about 4 mm, entirely a mountain species, and 

 G. nigrita, larger, about 4^ to 5 mm. and blacker, which 

 although usually found in moss on mountains, also 

 occurs in certain northern lowland localities as well. 



73 



