458 INSECTA. 



They inhabit mushrooms. But few species are known; one from 

 Cayenne and the rest from the north of Europe (a). 



Choleva, Lat. Spence, — Catops, Fab. — Peltis, Geoff. 



Most of the joints of the antennal club turbiniform and more or 

 less perfoliaceous ; maxillary palpi very salient and abruptly subulate ; 

 the body ovoid ; thorax plane, without a border ; the four first joints 

 of the anterior tarsi, and the first of the intermediate ones, dilated in 

 the males of some species — Catops blapsoides. Germ. 



In the Cholevae properly so called, the antennae are about the length 

 of the head and thorax ; their eighth joint, or the second of the club, 

 is evidently shorter than the preceding and following one, and some- 

 times is even indistinct; the last is semi-ovoidal and pointed *. 



In the Mylcechus, Lat., Oliv., — Catops, Payk., Gyll., the antennae 

 are shorter, tlie eighth joint is larger than the preceding, and almost 

 equal to the following one, the last is rounded and obtuse on the 

 summit f. 



The fifth tribe, or that of the Nitidularle, approximates to the 

 fourth in the scutiform and bordered body, but the mandibles are bifid 

 or emarginated at the extremity ; the tarsi seem to consist of but four 

 joints, the first and last, in some, being only visible beneath, where 

 they merely form a slight projection, and the penultimate in the re- 

 mainder being very small, in the form of a knot, enclosed between 

 the lobes of the preceding ones. The antennal club is always perfo- 

 liaceous, consists of three or four joints, and is usually short or but 

 little elongated. 



The palpi are short and filiform, or somewhat thickest at the ex- 

 tremity, The elytra in several are short or truncated. The legs are 

 but slightly elongated, and their tibiae frequently widened at the end; 

 the tarsi are furnished with hairs or pellets. The habitation of these 

 Insects varies with the species ; they are found on flowers, in mush- 

 rooms, putrified meat, and under the bark of trees. They form the 

 genus 



NiTIUULA. 



In some, the antennal club consists of but two joints, and the an- 

 terior part of the head projects in the manner of a semicircular flat- 

 tened clypeus, covering the mandibles and other parts of the mouth. 



* Lat. Gener. Crust, et Insect., II, p. 26. Seethe Monograph of this genus, 

 puhlished by M. Spence in the Lin. Trans., and Paykull and Gyllenhal. 

 t Lat. lb., p. 30, VIII, ii; Oliv., Encyclop. Method., article Mylaque, 



5:^ (a) Oliv., Col. II, 20. The Americans have at least one species, the S.'<i-gutia~ 

 fum, Knoch, Melsh. C;ital., if not another, the S. '^-pustulatum ? Id. lb. See Say, 

 Journ. of the Acad, of Nat. So. of Pbilad. Ill, 199.— Eng. Ed. 



