330 Mr. A. Murray on Coleoptera from Old Calabar. 
§ 2, Males with a projecting blade on the shoulder terminating in a spine. 
Females narrower, and with the projecting blade rounded off and 
without a spine. (See Pl. IX. figs, 18 & 18+.) 
11. g. Lycus premorsus, Schén. Syn. Ins. App. p. 25, pl. 5. 
fig. 1; Westwood, Introd. to Entomol. 1. p. 254, fig. 27 (6). . 
@. Lycus latissimus, Schon. ibid. fig. 3. 
Var. L. harpago, Thomson, Arch. Ent. ii. 76; Lacord., Genera Col. pl. 45. 
fig. 5. | 
I know of at least four varieties of Lycus preemorsus. 
. Var. a. premorsus (type). The typical form red b 
Schénherr snl Wi accined in which ie is no pre blac 
band across the elytra, but merely two marginal spots and the 
apical one. This variety has the emargination of the apex of 
the elytra very distinct. The underside is said by Schénherr 
to be black. 
This I have not received from Old Calabar. 
Var. B. harpago. The Lycus harpago of Thomson, which 
appears to be only a variety of premorsus. He says it is very - 
nearly allied to it, but differs by its size being greater, by its 
elytra being more strongly dilated, by the ‘na band bein 
complete, by the truncature not being so strongly spined, and: 
by its yellow abdomen. Now, as to its. size, the difference is 
too slight to allow that alone to be reckoned as a distinctive 
character; and I have specimens agreeing in all other respects 
with the characters of L. harpago, but no larger than Schin- 
herr’s typical pramorsus. Indeed the only difference between 
one of the Old-Calabar varieties of premorsus and the figure of 
harpago in Lacordaire’s ‘ Genera des Coleoptéres’ is that it is 
somewhat smaller. Next,as to the elytra being more dilated, this 
is the case in my own larger specimens, but not in the smaller. 
It is a character, or perhaps a deceptio visus, arising from the 
increased dimensions.. The median band, although styled by 
Thomson complete, is not complete in Lacordaire’s figure, but. 
only interruptedly complete, the two large, broad median mar- 
ginal patches being only semiunited by a much narrower, 
black, irregular line, of diverse thickness, interrupted in two 
parts. I have specimens, both male and female, with the band 
exactly so interrupted, and others not interrupted at all, others’ 
without the uniting line at all, and another with about the 
whole of the latter half of the elytra invaded by black. This 
extension of the black colour across the elytra cannot, therefore, 
be regarded as a character of much importance. The trunca- 
ture of the apex of the elytra being more feebly emarginate is 
also a small character; and I should scarcely like to say that. 
in my specimens it was more feebly emarginate ; in the next 
e- “ 
