LUCANID^. SINODENDRON. 167 



at the apex, crenulated in the middle within, the crenulations unequal and 

 variable in number ; the head not so large as the thorax, without elevated 

 margins. 



Var. y. With the apex of the mandibles obtuse, subtruncate, not bifurcate, the 

 inner margin with two obtuse denticulations. 



The male varies extremely in the dentation and bulk of the mandibles, scarcely 

 two specimens being precisely similar, and every intermediate grade between 

 the two extremes being observable, seems to militate against the opinion of 

 there being more than one species found in this country : — both sexes also 

 vary considerably in size. 



This species, which is the largest Coleopterous insect found in 

 Britain, occurs in the utmost profusion in the neighbourhood of 

 Ripley, Cobham, and in other parts of Surry; also at Darenth, 

 Birch-wood, in the New Forest, Devonshire, &c. " I once found 

 a specimen lying dead on the sea-shore (near Swansea), and it 

 had probably been washed up Math the tide." — L. W. Dilhoyn, 

 Esq. " Has never occurred in Cambridgeshire to my know- 

 ledge. 1 ' — Rev. L. Jenyns. " Epping." — Mr. Doubleday. 



Genus CLXXXIX. — Sinodendron, Fabr'icius. 



Antennae much shorter than the thorax ; the basal joint about half their length, 

 slightly tumid at the apex; second short, subglobose; the five following 

 short, transverse, the remainder forming a serrated compressed triarticulate 

 club, the joints of which are trigonal- transverse. Palpi, maxillary with the 

 last joint cylindric-oval ; labial with the terminal joint very stout : mandibles 

 very short, concealed beneath the clypeus: mentum narrow, entire, cari- 

 nated : head small, with a horn on the clypeus, elongate in the male : thorax 

 dissimilar in the sexes: body convex, cylindric: legs short: tibiae spinose 

 externally : tarsi short, the terminal joint very large. 



This anomalous genus has been constantly shifted about by syste- 

 matic writers, some placing it with the present family, others with 

 Oryctes and its allies, but from which however it seems abundantly 

 to differ, and the rather to associate with the Lucanidse, from the 

 other indigenous genera of which it disagrees, by having the body 

 convex, cylindric, the antennae very short, with the second joint 

 subglobose, and the capitulum composed of three lamellae only, the 

 mandibles concealed, and the mentum small. 



Sp. 1. cylindricum. Nigrum, thorace antice truncato, quinque dentaio, capitis 

 cornu recurvo, posticefulvo-hirto. (Long. corp. 6 — 9 lin.) 



Sc. cylindricus. Linni:— Si. cylindricum. Don. xi. pi. 368.— Steph. Catal. 101. 

 No. 1088. 



Mandibulata. Vol. III. 30th Sept. 1830. n 



