THE CAPRICORN ES FORM THE RASORIAL TYPE. 2$9 



pectinated, or very long antennae ; because,, if so, the bulky 

 Dynastidce should have longer antennae than any of the 

 other Lamellicornes, which they have not : but here we 

 find the same analogy manifested under another character. 

 Rasorial types are pre-eminently horned, or furnished 

 with crests or tubercles, representing the real horns of 

 ruminating quadrupeds. It is therefore under this form 

 that nature shows us which is the rasorial type among 

 the Cetoniadce; and nearly every entomologist who has 

 mentioned these singular and unwieldy beetles, has com- 

 pared them to horned cattle. All the leading types of 

 nature are to be known by some three or four peculiar 

 characters ; but as we recede from the highest point of 

 perfection, some one or more of these will gradually dis- 

 appear : it therefore inevitably follows, that there are 

 comparatively few instances which show a combination 

 of all the typical characters ; because, in every group, the 

 typical examples are much fewer than the aberrant. 

 Hence a rasorial type may be indicated by the possession 

 of horns, without any unusual developement of the an- 

 tennae, as is the case with the Dynastince and the Mega-, 

 sorri'lnce. If both these characters are wanting, nature 

 confers upon the type some other of the rasorial cha- 

 racters, namely, an unusually long neck, as in the Ca- 

 melopardalis, the swan and ostrich among birds, and Agra 

 and Casnonia among the predaceous beetles. If none of 

 these indications of the rasorial type are seen, nature is 

 still consistent ; for she ornaments her type with ocel- 

 lated or rounded spots, in imitation of the peacock that 

 bird which stands at the head of the Rasores, and in 

 which she has consequently concentrated all the rasorial 

 characters in the highest perfection. These remarks, 

 although introduced to illustrate the genus Distichocera, 

 must be considered as applying to all natural groups 

 throughout the animal kingdom. 



(270.) We shall conclude with a few remarks on the 

 genus Euryptera. Most entomologists, upon a hasty 

 glance, may be tempted to look upon this as a very ano- 

 .malous form, whose admission among the Necydalin 



