416 COLEOPTERA 



what securiform. The antenna are blackish, joints four to eight 

 serrate, ninth and tenth oblong, eleventh normal. Head with cinereous 

 pubescence behind, the forehead nude and almost smooth. Thorax 

 not much longer than broad, clothed like the head. The elytra are 

 rather convex, their sides slightly rounded, a little narrowed near the 

 shoulders, and not much attenuated posteriorly ; the scutellar region is 

 somewhat depressed, and, in some examples, the greyish pubescence 

 becomes quite white along the suture. The tibia are a little bent ; the 

 front pair not longer than their tarsi ; the intermediate are longer, and 

 their tarsi elongate and slender, and the spurs of the posterior are of 

 moderate size. 



Length, 2 lines. 



This species also occurs at Tairua. 



FAMILY RHIPIPHORIDES. 



Mentum with a peduncle. Ligula membraneous, more or less 

 prominent. Maxilla bilobed, lamelliform, ciliated, soldered at the 

 base, their inner lobe sometimes rudimentary or entirely absent. Ter- 

 minal joint of the maxillary palpi never securiform. Mandibles without 

 internal membraneous plate. Head vertical, supported on the front 

 coxae, with a narrow neck, completely sunk in the prothorax, its vertex 

 often passing beyond the front margin of the thorax. Eyes large, 

 emarginate or otherwise. Antenna with eleven or ten joints, variably 

 inserted on the head, pectinate or flabellate among the males, often 

 serrate or dentate among the females. Prothorax wider than the elytra 

 at the base, the pronotum confounded with its flanks in front. Elytra 

 sometimes covering the abdomen, sometimes abbreviated and gaping ; 

 in the latter case the under-wings not folded below them. Legs long : 

 the anterior coxa contiguous, projecting, reposing on the intermediate 

 and without trochantina, their cotyloid cavities very widely open behind; 

 the intermediate generally slightly separated, transversal or oblique, and 

 with or without trochantina ; the posterior transversal, lamelliform, and 

 contiguous : spurs of the tibiae variable ; tarsi slender, the two front 

 pairs with five joints, the posterior with four ; the penultimate joint of 

 all entire: claws pectinate or dentate, rarely simple. The abdomen 

 composed of five or eight distinct segments. 



RMpistena. 



Sharp ; Entom. Mon. Mag., Sept., 1878, /. 81. 



I give below the characters, so far as I can see them, of a species 

 which seems to be a very interesting form of Rhipiphorides, but to 

 connect that family with the Mordellides ; if the antennae and head were 

 hidden, the insect might readily be passed over as a slender Mordelli- 

 stena. 



Antenna short, eleven-jointed, the four basal joints moderately long 

 and stout, the other seven very short, but each giving off a long slender 

 lobe ; their insertion is a long way from the front of the clypeus near 



