122 • [November, 



two names have been duly recorded in the Catalogues of British 

 Coleoptera that have appeared since that time. 



In 1882, Bedel published (Faune Col. Seine, vi, p. 40) a brief 

 description of a species he calls G. socius, as occurring in France, but 

 without localities or particulars. 



In 1885, Uhagon described some new species of Cathormiocerus, 

 accompanied by three pages of remarks on G. socius (Ann. Soc. Esp., 

 xiv, p. — ?, 13 of sep.). He states that Srs. C. Brisout de Barneville 

 and Bedel have informed him that the French G. socius described by 

 Bedel is G. maritimus, Bye, and by a series of logical propositions, 

 arrives at the conclusion that G. socius, Bedel, and G. maritimus, Bye, 

 are one species, and suggests that G. socius, Schon., as regards its 

 Spanish examples, is probably a distinct species ; also on comparing a 

 French G. socius, Bedel, with a Spanish example (from the Cuadarrama, 

 not from the Sierra Nevada), he finds some distinctions between them 

 which he duly records. 



In 1886, Bedel gives (Faune Col. Seine, vi, p. 234) French locali- 

 ties for his T. socius (the genus being merged in Trachyplilceus) , and 

 adds that, according to Uhagon, the specimens from Normandy and 

 Brittany are G. maritimus, Bye, " and which appears to be only a 

 variety of socius" 



In 1885, Stierlin (Mitt. Schw. Ent. Ges., vii, p. 142), in the 

 Bestimmungs-Tabellen europaischer Biisselkafer, gives socius and 

 maritimus as distinct species, assigning to the former only Spain as its 

 country, and to the latter France and England. 



It will be seen from the above that authors have been in strange 

 disagreement about these insects, due partly to the supposition that a 

 species inhabiting the Sierra Nevada and England had something 

 wrong about it, partly to the paucity of specimens which did not per- 

 mit them actually to test this suspicion by observation, but also largely 

 to the fact that they failed to make themselves acquainted with what 

 had been written by others. 



We are now in a position to speak with certainty on most of the 

 dubious points, as one of us has secured a large -series of examples 

 in the Isle of Wight, and the other has taken the species both in 

 the Isle of Wight and in the Sierra Nevada. Sharp being in pos- 

 session of a small series (7) of examples captured by him on the 18th 

 July, 1879, at the margins of the snow-fields, at a great elevation, in 

 the Sierra Nevada, we have compared these with the Isle of Wight 

 examples, and find them quite similar. This conclusion does not 

 appear open to any doubt for this species, G. socius, is so distinct from 



