Mr. F. P. Pascoe on Sphserion and Mallocera. 477 



LXII. — Notes on Sphserion and Mallocera. 

 By Francis P. Pascoe, F.L.S., F.Z.S., late Pres. Ent. Soc., &c. 



Many of the tropical American genera of the Longicorn family 

 Cerambycidfe are crowded with discrepant species, most of which, 

 although undescribed, have manuscript or catalogue names in 

 collections. As a rule, these species seem to have been referred 

 to such of the comparatively few published genera to which they 

 appear most approximate, without regard to their technical cha- 

 racters. I have been recently examining Sphcerion and Mallo- 

 cera, two allied genera belonging to the same subfamily as the 

 typical Ceramhyx, and I find under each of those names forms 

 that could never be held together by any definitive formulae. 

 The following notes are only the results of the working out of 

 my own limited number of examples, aided, however, by the 

 examination of those in the British Museum, including M. 

 Chevrolat's, in which so many of the celebrated Baron Dejean's 

 " catalogue-types " are found. 



Mr. Newman^s genus Nephalius*, which has been regarded 

 almost invariably as purely synonymous with Sphcerion, ought, 

 I think, to be preserved for those of his species which have the 

 elytra imperfectly embracing the abdomen, or, in other words, 

 elytra without or with very slightly deflected sides. The 

 type would then be N. cassus, and the genus would include 

 N. serins and N. exutus ; of his other species, iV. amictus is un- 

 known to me, and N. blandus is a true Spheerion. The remain- 

 ing species of Sphcerion which I have examined are : — S. ci/ani- 

 penne, Serv. (the type), S. armigerum, Wh., S. terminatum, Per- 

 roud, S.suturale (Dej.), S.plicicolle, Germ., S. geniculatum, n. sip,, 

 S. pubescens, 01., S. Erichsonii, Wh., S. subpiceum, Wh., and 

 S. Poeyi, Chev. S. orientale, Wh., >S^. inerme, Wh., S. triste, 

 Guer., and S. insulare, Wh., may be regarded as degraded mem- 

 bers of the genus. Two species [S. melanura and S. procerum), 

 described by Erichson in Schomburgk's 'lleisen in Britisch- 

 Guiana,' are unknown to me; so also is S. rusticum, lately 

 published by Prof. Burmeister in the ' Stettiner Entom. Zeitung' 

 (1865, p. 167). Of the undescribed Sphserions I have selected 

 those only for description for which new genera will be neces- 

 sary, and have characterized two species hitherto only known by 

 their catalogue-names. 



* Entom. p. 93. The genus, however, can scarcely be said to be charac- 

 terized by Mr. Newman. M. Thomson afterwards described " Nephalius" 

 in his ' Essai' (p. 245), but in his later work, * Systema Cerambycidarum,' 

 he revokes the name with the note " nee Newman," and proposes ' Peri- 

 boeum' for the generic name of the species previously published by him as 

 Nephalius acuminatus. 



Ann. ^ Mag, N, Hist. Ser. 3. Vol, xviii. 33 



