Mr. T. V. Wollaston o/i the Coleoptera of St. Helena. 403 



bodies, their obsolete scutella, and the other essential points 

 of their structure, it is impossible to help perceiving that they 

 are all nearly akin inter se, and cannot properly be separated. 

 I have, however, formed a distinct section for the dentate spe- 

 cies, and have given to it a provisional name, in tlie event of 

 its being found desirable hereafter to detach it from the other." 

 " Although members of the same subfamily, and possessing 

 a five-jointed funiculus, the Microxylobii are essentially dis- 

 tinct from the Pentartlira^ and may be regarded as a little 

 geographical assemblage, in all probability (like the Caulo- 

 trujjides in Madeira), peculiar to St. Helena. Apart from their 

 very great difference of outward configuration, and the spini- 

 ferous femora of some of them, they may be known from the 

 Pentartkra (which are narrow, cylindrical, linear, deeply 

 sculptured insects, on the Mesites and Cossonus type) by their 

 obsolete scutellum and more elongated limbs and rostrum — 

 the latter of which is, moreover, less straightened, and has 

 the antennae inserted much nearer to its apex ; whilst the an- 

 tenna of the Pentartlira are, in both sexes, medial, or (if any- 

 thing, perhaps) implanted a trifle even behind^ the middle 

 rather than before it." 



§ I. Femora mutica. (Microxylobii typici.) 

 A. Funiculi art'^ l'""* secundo distincte latior; 2"^"* tertio via; longior. 



35. Microxylohius Westwoodii. 



M. " nigro-seneus, glaber ; capite rostroque punctulatis, thorace 

 constricto infra apicem, elytris subrugatis, corpore subtus puncta- 

 tissimo. Long. corp. lin. circiter 1, lat. j lin. — Ex museo Dom, 

 Saunders. Habitat ins. St, Helena." [Ex Chevrolat.'] 



Microxi/lobius Westwoodii, Chevr., Trans. Ent. Soc. Lond. i. 98, pi. 10. 



f. 6 (1836). 

 , WoU., ibid. V. (n. s.) 381 (1861). 



This species being the one for which the genus was origi- 

 nally founded by M. Chevrolat, I have no choice but to regard 

 it as the type of the group ; and it is therefore extremely un- 

 fortunate that I should have been unable to obtain a glance at 

 the individual from which Prof. Westwood's excellent figure 

 which accompanied the diagnosis was drawn. Judging from 

 the plate alone, I should have been contented to cite the follow- 

 ing species (which I describe under the trivial name of vestitus) 

 as the true M. Westwoodii, had not Chevrolat distinctly stated 

 his insect to be glabrous, and not only to have its elytra less 

 parallel (or more expanded behind the middle) and with the base 



* This, however, la hardly the case in the St. -Helena P. suhccecwn. 



29* 



