116 SERRIOORMA. [Campylus. 



CAMPYIiUS, Fischer. (Denticollii> t Filler; Leptwoides, Herbst.) 



This genus is easily distinguished from all our other Elateridae by having 

 the eyes very prominent and entirely free, not touching the angles of 

 the thorax, and the forehead with the anterior margin sharply raised and 

 reflexed; the intermediate coxae are somewhat approximate ; the antenna) 

 are very long ; the thorax is truncate at apex, and the posterior angles 

 are not carinate ; the genus contains about fifteen species, which are 

 confined to Europe, the Black Sea region, Northern Asia, and North 

 America ; our single British species stretches across Europe and Siberia ; 

 it is very variable in colour, and superficially resembles certain species 

 of Telephone ; the larva is dark brown, slightly reddish ; it bears a 

 strong resemblance to the larvae of certain species of Athous. 



C. linearis, L. ( ? mesomelas, L.). Elongate and parallel-sided, 

 colour very variable ; male with the head, except front, black, the 

 thorax red, occasionally darker on disc, and the elytra testaceous, with 

 or without dark suture, rarely black, female with the head and thorax 

 as in male, elytra black with borders testaceous, or testaceous with the 

 suture broadly black, or rarely testaceous; head strongly punctured, 

 antennae long, with the second joint very short; thorax longer than 

 broad, very coarsely punctured, with sides rounded and narrowed in 

 front, posterior angles sharp, very projecting and divaricate; there is a 

 deep longitudinal channel on disc, and two strong transverse impressions 

 before base nearly meeting the central channel; elytra with coarsely 

 punctured striae, interstices punctured and transversely rugose ; under- 

 side black, apex of abdomen testaceous; legs lighter or darker testaceous, 

 more or less pitchy, with the femora usually dark, sometimes almost 

 entirely pitchy. L. 9-12 mm. 



Male with the thorax narrower and less rounded in front, and the 

 elytra narrower and more parallel-sided; female with the thorax broader 

 and more rounded in front, and the elytra more ample, somewhat 

 dilated behind middle. 



By beating and sweeping in woods, &c. ; has also been bred from birch stumps ; 

 Bomewhat local, but not uncommon and generally distributed throughout the greater 

 piirt of England and Scotland, and probably Ireland. Dr. Sharp records it as local in 

 Scotland in the Solway, Tweed, Tay, Dee, and Moray districts ; the female appears to 

 be much scarcer than the male, as far as my own experience goes. 



DASCILLIDJE. 



This family connects the section Malacodermata or Malacodermi of 

 various authors with the Cebrionidae and Rhipiceridse, neither of which 

 families are represented in Britain ; the genus Cebrio is rather closely 

 connected with Campylus, with which it agrees in having the prosternum 

 produced into a process behind ; in fact it is by some authors included 

 under the Elateridae ; on the other hand it bears in many respects a 

 strong affinity to Dascillu*, and also to Rhipicera and CalUrhipis, which 



