CH&YSOMEL1D BEETLES. 103 



obolus, coiled up in burrows in the mold and sand. 

 They are the largest examples I have yet seen, being 

 four and a half inches in length, grayish brown in 

 color and with a median row of small reddish spots 

 along the dorsal surface. 



On the leaves of the saw palmetto, I find occasion- 

 ally a small and very handsome Chrysomelid beetle, 

 which adheres to the leaf so closely that I can scarcely 

 pull it away. It is one of the tortoise beetles, Porphy- 

 raspis cyanea Say, deep violaceus blue in color, and 

 less than one-quarter of an inch in size. The thorax 

 is emarginate in front, so that the head is visible from 

 above, while the outer wings and thorax contain nu- 

 merous large pits or punctures. A single example of 

 a closely allied, but larger form, Chelymorpha argus 

 Licht., not before listed from Florida, was also taken 

 from a leaf of a convolvulus plant. It is reddish 

 brown, with vestiges of small black spots, on wings 

 and thorax, and is much smaller than in Indiana, 

 where it occurs frequently on the leaves of bind- 

 weeds. The spots are also much larger in the north- 

 ern specimens. They are seventeen in number, so 

 that by Say the insect was described as C. 17-punc- 

 tata. 



In the old fields and pine-barrens of this region one 

 often sees a great mound of sand thrown up about the 

 mouth of a large burrow, which resembles closely that 

 of the ground-hog or woodchuck of the northern 

 states. However, it is not the home of a mammal, but 



