CARABID^E. DROMIUS. 9 



Oblong, rather depressed. Head pitchy brown, wide, with a 

 deep fovea on each side between the antennae ; eyes large, globose 

 and black, palpi and antennae pale testaceous. Thorax ferrugi- 

 nous, subquadrate, rounded in front below the anterior angles, 

 narrowed behind, margins reflexed, base truncate, hinder angles 

 somewhat rotundate, base with a more or less distinct fovea on 

 each side. Elytra fuscous or pitchy, sometimes with a pale 

 oblong patch on each rather before the middle, sometimes 

 wholly testaceous in less mature examples, much wider than the 

 thorax, shoulders rounded, sides rather widest behind the middle, 

 apex as usual truncate, disk rather depressed, obsoletely striated, 

 with a series of impressions between the second and third, and 

 another between the seventh and eighth striae ; body beneath 

 testaceous red, legs pale. Length 2f lines. 



This species is rather variable in colour, and occasionally in 

 some slight degree in form, the thorax being more quadrate in 

 some examples, and the sides less rounded in front, than in 

 others, which variations have led to the supposition that they 

 are distinct species. I have examined carefully the insects 

 recorded by Mr. Stephens under the names meridionalis and 

 fenestratus, and they appear to be simply varieties of this species, 

 whose claim to distinction rests upon an eccentricity of colour, 

 but upon no constant or very material difference in form or 

 sculpture. Dr. Schaum considers D. fenestratus of Stephens' s 

 Collection a variety of testaceus, Erichson, with a yellow dash on 

 the anterior part of the elytra; it is described by Dejean as 

 agilis, var. a, and I believe correctly, for the several examples 

 received from abroad of testaceus , Erichson, do not, upon a close 

 examination, present differences of sufficient importance to 

 warrant their separation. Whether, as Dr. Schaum supposes 

 (Stettin Ent. Zeit.), D. fenestratus, Stephens, differs from 



C. fenestratus. Fab., or whether it be perfectly identical with it, 

 the latter itself is now generally accepted as a variety also of 



D. agilis. 



This species is generally distributed, and is in many parts of 

 the kingdom abundant, under the bark of trees and among the 

 damp herbage of hedge-banks. 



4. D. quadrimaculatus : oblongus ; capite nigro, thorace rufo, 

 subquadrato, angulis rotundatis ; elytris substriatis, fuscis, 

 maculis duabus antennis pedibusque pattidis. 



Carabus quadrimaculatus, Linn. F. S. 813. Fab. S. El. 1. 207. 

 Lebia quadrimaculata, Gyll. Ins. Suec. 2. 186. Dufts. Faun. 

 2. 250. 



