Mr. T. V. Wollaston on the Tarphii. 375 



In the remaining portion of this paper I propose to describe the 

 nine Tarphii which have hitherto been observed at the Canaries. 

 On the special interest which attaches to that curious genus it is 

 needless for me here to dilate ; for, so far as the Madeiran and 

 Canarian archipelagoes are concerned, it is not too much to say that 

 there is no Coleopterous form more important geographically than 

 Tarphius. Confined almost exclusively to the damp laurel-groves 

 of intermediate and lofty elevations, where they may be found ad- 

 hering to sticks and pieces of rotten wood, the members of it are no 

 less remarkable for their numbers than they are for their inactive or 

 sedentary modes of life ; and I think I may safely add that I have 

 never examined a single laurel-region in any of those islands with- 

 out detecting one or more of the exponents of this anomalous group. 



Yet, though the head-quarters of Tarphius seem to be, unmis- 

 takeably, in the intermediate zones of these mountainous sub- African 

 islands, like most other forms topographically circumscribed, it would 

 appear to be not altogether destitute of an outlying member or two 

 in regions far removed from that which must be regarded as par ex- 

 cellence its own; and, accordingly, until I commenced collecting in 

 Madeira, in 1847, it was known to science by merely a solitary 

 beetle of the utmost rarity — the T. gibbulus from Sicily. While 

 concentrated, therefore, to such an extent in the Atlantic islands, 

 that, up to the present date, as many as nineteen well-defined re- 

 presentatives have been discovered at the Madeiras and nine in the 

 Canaries, we have the above-mentioned Sicilian one to account for : 

 and I would wish here to state that it is these " outlying members " 

 of apterous, phlegmatic- groups bike Tarphius (totally removed, as 

 they are, from all the contingencies of accidental diffusion) which 

 offer the greatest difficulty to the hypothesis of those naturalists who 

 believe that all species have been produced by an imaginary process 

 of evolution, or the branching-off of erratic races in different (though 

 each of them undeviating) directions from a parent stock. 



However optional this fancy may be, there would beat least nothing, 

 so far, absolutely against it (but rather the reverse) if the species of all 

 known genera on the earth's surface were topographically associ- 

 ated ; for it is clear that where the ancestors have flourished, there 

 for the most part will be found their descendants. Nor would I 

 desire to ignore the fact, that on a broad scale this geographical 

 grouping is pretty clearly indicated. But, unfortunately for the 

 theory, there are just enough of insuperable exceptions to the rule to 

 convince us that it is not universally applicable ; or, in other words, 

 while most species whieh are nearly allied inter se range over the 



