274 INSKCTA. 



Carabus, Lin. 



Where the maxillae simply terminate in a point or hook, without an 

 articulated extremity. 



Their head is usually narrower than the thorax, or, at most, of the 

 same width; their mandibles, those of a few excepted, have no den- 

 tations or but very few; the ligula usually projects, and the labial 

 palpi exhibit but three free joints(l). Many of them are destitute 

 of wings, only having elytra. They frequently diffuse a fetid odour, 

 atid eject an acrid and caustic liquid from the anus. Geoffroy be- 

 lieved that the ancients designated Carabici under the name of 

 Buprestes, Insects which they considered as highly poisonous, par- 

 ticularly to Oxen(2). 



The Carabici conceal themselves in the ground, under stones, chips, 

 ba[% of old trees, Sec, and are mostly very active. Their larvae 

 have the same habits. This tribe is very numerous, and forms a 

 most difficult study. 



We will compose a first general subdivision with those, the termi- 

 nation of whose exterior palpi is not subulate; their last joint is 

 not united with the preceding one to form either an oval body 

 acutely pointed at the end, or a conoid terminated by a slender and 

 acicular point. 



These Carabici may be subdivided into those whose two anterior 

 tibiae have a deep notch on the inner side, separating the two spines 

 which are usually placed near each other at the extremity of this 

 side, and into those where these tibiae^present no emargination, or if 

 any, a mere oblique, linear canal, which does not reach their ante- 

 rior side. 



Of this subdivision we will make several sections: 



1. The Truncatipennes,.so called because the posterior extremity 

 of their elytra is almost always tr^uncated. The head and thorax are 

 narrower than the abdomen. The ligula is most commonly oval or 

 square, and is rarely accompanied on the sides by salient divisions. 



The hooks of the tarsi, in some, are simple or not dentated, but 

 arranged like the teeth of a comb. 



We will commence with those in which the head is not abruptly 

 narrowed at its posterior extremity, and is not attached to the tho- 

 rax by a sort of suddenly formed neck, or by a species of patella. 



(1^ In Cicindela the radical joint is free, and it is on this account that the palpi 

 consist of four; but here it is entirely adherent and forms but one base which is 

 not counted. 



(2) See the genus Meloe. 



