INSECTA. 
422 
there is a union of several other metallic colours. Their body, in 
general, is oval, somewhat wider and obtuse, or truncated before, 
and narrowed behind from the base of the abdomen, which occupies 
the greater part of its length. The eyes are oval, and the thorax is 
short and wide. The scutel small or null. The extremity of the 
elytra is more or less dentated in many. The legs are short. 
They walk very slowly, but fly well in hot and dry weather. 
When about to be seized, they let themselves fall to the ground. At 
the posterior extremity of the abdomen of the females is a coriaceous, 
laminiform, conical appendage, composed of three parts, the last 
annuli of the abdomen ; it is properly an instrument with which they 
deposit their ova in dry wood, the habitat of their larvae. Several 
small species are met with on leaves and flowers ; most of the others, 
however, are found in forests, and wood-yards ; they sometimes ap- 
pear in houses, where they have been transported, in wood, in the 
state of a larva or chrysalis. 
Sometimes the antennae are at most dentated like a saw. The 
intermediate joints of the tarsi are in the form of a reversed heart, 
and the penultimate, at least, is bifid. The palpi are filiform or very 
little thicker at the end. The jaws are bilobate. 
Bupbestis, Lin. 
In the true Buprestis, the antennae are of equal thickness through- 
out, and serrated from the third or fourth joint. 
Some have no scutel. 
B. fasiculata, L. ; Oliv., Col. II, 32, IV, 38. About an inch 
long; ovoid, convex; densely punctured and wrinkled; of a 
golden or cupreous-green, sometimes dusky, with little tufts of 
yellowish or reddi'-h hairs; elytra entire. From the Cape of 
Good Hope, where it is often found in such abundance on the 
same shrub, that the plant seems loaded with flowers. 
B. sternicornis, L. ; Oliv., Col., Ib., VI, 52, a. Somewhat 
larger, and of the same form ; green, slightly gilded, and very 
brilliant ; large punctures, ornamented at bottom with whitish 
scales on the elytra ; three teeth at their extremity ; poststernum 
projecting in the form of a horn. The East Indies. 
B . chrysis,'Ea.h. Oliv., lb., II., 8, VI, 52, 6. Differing from 
the sternicornis in the elytra, which are chesnut-brown, and 
without whitish spots. 
B. vittata. Fab. ; Oliv,, Ib. Ill, 17. Nearly an inch and a half 
long; narrower and more elongated than the preceding species; 
depressed ; bluish-green ; four elevated lines, and a cupreous and 
golden band on each elytron, the end of which is bidentate. 
East Indies. 
B. ocellata, Fab. ; Oliv., Ib. I, 3. Almost similar to the pre- 
ceding in form and size ; a large, yellow, phosphoric spot be- 
tween two golden ones, on each elytron, which is tridentate at 
the extremity. 
The others are furnished with a scutel. 
B. giyas,h.i Oliv., Ib. I, 1. Two inches long; thorax cu- 
preous, mixed with brilliant green, and two large smooth spots 
