There still exists so much obscurity respecting the larvae of 

 Meloe, that I can onl}^ give a sketch which will enable my 

 readers to search for themselves ; and it is very surprising that 

 no one in this country should have reared them from the eggs. 



We learn from DeGeer that the eggs are oblong, of a pale 

 orange colour, and are deposited in the earth in a cluster in 

 May, and the larvae are hatched the month after. These ap- 

 pear to be parasitical on other insects, for he placed some flies 

 with them, and remarked that the larvse attached themselves 

 in great numbers to the thorax of the Diptera, which speedily 

 perished. Bees also are subject to their attacks, and MM. Le- 

 pelletier and Servile appear to have confirmed DeGeer re- 

 cently by breeding the same animals from the eggs of Meloe. 

 On the other hand Mr. Kirby is disposed to think that his Pe- 

 dicidus Melittce (P. Apis Lijm.l) is not the larva of Meloe; 

 and M. Leon Dufour has even formed them into a genus under 

 the name of Triunmlai-is andrcnetarum. and a fi<jure of one 

 is given in the 13th volume of the "Annales des Sciences 

 Naturelles. 



Mr. W. S. MacLeay, relying on the accuracy of DeGeer, 

 seems to regard these little animals as typical of the Thysanu- 

 riform larva, which marks one of his five great divisions of the 

 Coleoptera. 



The following are our British species. 



I. Antennae thickened and distorted in the middle. 

 .1. M. violaceus Mar. — April, May, and June; meadows and sunny banks, 

 feeding upon the stalks of chickweed and other plants. 



2. M. proscarabEeus Ijinn. — vulgaris Ste. — Found with the last. 



3. M. tectus Panz. — June, woods, Hampstead. 



4. M. autumnalis Oliv, — glabratus L,ea. — punctatus Mar. — End of August 



and beginning of September, near Exmouth, Devon, Mr. Newman, 



II. Antennse simple. 



5. M. brevicollis Pflnr.— cephalotes Curt. mas. — April, meadows, Devon. 



Taken also near Christchurch, Hants, by the Rev. T. Cooke, to 

 whom I am indebted for the male figured ; and beginning of May, 

 Windsor Forest, Mr. Alexander Griesbach. 



6. M. cicatricosus Lea. — April and May. Grassy banks, Southend, Mar- 



gate and Ramsgate. 



7. M. variegatus Don. — April and May. Feversham and Margate. 



8. M. punctatus Fab. — Tuccia Boss'i. — rugosus 2Iar. — autumnalis Lea. — 



August, Margate. Middle of October, on Syngenesious plants and 

 in a chalk-pit, and on a grassy bank iind April, at Ramsgate, Mr, 

 Hanson. 



By consulting the British INIuseum cabinet, I find that Dr. 

 Leach has corrected an error that occurred in his Monograph 

 in the lltli volume of the Linnsean Transactions (where the 

 species are all figured), and which misled me, when I lately 

 published the genus in the " Guide," at which time also I be- 

 lieved the insect figured to be a new species ; and it is so dif- 

 ferent in many respects to the Museum specimens, which are 

 females I believe, that had it not been for an authentic Ger- 

 man one I should still have considered it to be distinct. The 

 plant is Cistiis Helianthcmtim (Dwarf Cistus). 



