THE PENTATOMID.rE. 119 



entirely membranaceous texture of the superior wings. 

 In this family, the latter structure occurs in all the true 

 Pentatomce. Very little is actually known of the habits 

 of these insects; it is presumable, however, that the 

 majority feed upon other insects ; and a friend of ours 

 has observed Pentatoma bidens preying upon Vanessa 

 /o, which implies a degree of skill in the capture of its 

 prey we were scarcely prepared to expect in any of this 

 group. If there be no mistake in the account given us 

 by Westermann, of the destruction caused by Thyreo- 

 coris silpho'ides in rice fields, in Hindostan, the family 

 evidently feeds upon a variety of substances ; although 

 may it not be that these insects are found in profusion 

 amongst those crops, themselves seeking the true de- 

 stroyer? We can here give but a very general idea of 

 the group, which is so large, that the space we can allot 

 to it would scarcely suffice to record their generic names. 

 In the next family, the Corei, which, from their great 

 variety, will scarcely yield to a collective character, we 

 observe insects in which the sides of the abdomen are 

 frequently considerably and angularly dilated; the wings, 

 when closed, having their sides always parallel, and 

 leaving those lateral portions of the abdomen uncovered; 

 but this dilatation is not always found in them. It is 

 observed chiefly in Coreus itself, and remarkably so in 

 Phyllomorphus paradoxus and hystrix, in which these 

 appendages are dilated into thin lobated plates, and ex- 

 tend also from the sides of the prothorax. In Anisocelis 

 we observe the posterior tibise laterally dilated into a thin 

 foliaceous appendage, as are the antennae in Pachylis, 

 which besides contains the largest species of the family ; 

 one, the P. gigas Kirby, being more than an inch and a half 

 long. In Physomerus, Jlferocoris, and Meropachys, we 

 find very largely swollen posterior femora. Some of 

 these insects still present a moderately large scutellum, 

 which, although less than in the preceding family, is 

 always larger than in the next ; and in Menenotus, which 

 seems to connect the Cord with the Pentatomce, we find 

 the thorax produced laterally forwards,, giving it the 

 i 4 



