1904.] OF THE GENUS HIPPORRHIXUS. 7 



hours which I spent tliei'e. During a stay in Oxford, my kind 

 friend Prof. Poulton gave nie the fi'eest access to the vahiable 

 collections in the Hoj)e Depai'tnient, which I'esulted in the dis- 

 covery of a number of tlie missing Schonheriian types of Ourcu- 

 lionidfe, including one Hipporrhin/us, the rare H. capicola Gyl. 

 The present paper, however, was only rendered 230ssible by my 

 visit to (Stockholm, where, through the kindness of Profs. Auri- 

 villius and Sjostedt, I was able thoroughly to study the original 

 collections of Schonherr and Chevrolat, as well as all Fahra?us' 

 types in the genei-al Museum collection, 



I have personally examined examples of all the sjoecies described 

 in this paper, with the exception of four only ; although it is 

 quite possible that in the case of some of Gyllenhal's species, the 

 types of which have been lost, my identification from the descrip- 

 tion only may eventually prove to be incorrect. The four species 

 referred to are carinirostris Clyl., sithlineatus Gyl., coronatus 

 Fst., and quadrispinosus F. Possibly the last species does not 

 belong to the genus at all, for Fabricius' description is useless for 

 the purpose of identification. Wherever it has been possible — 

 and this was fortunately so in the great majority of cases — the 

 type specimens have been examined ; but unfortunately in the 

 case of the collections made by Ecklon & Zeyher and by Drege, 

 Schonherr appears to have returned a number of his types to 

 the collectors. The whereabouts of these types I have so far 

 failed to trace. Mr. Peringuey kindly lent me for examination a 

 printed price-list, issued by Ecklon & Zeyher, of all their Soiith 

 African insects, from which I inferred that their collection was 

 distributed piecemeal in many dii*ections. Mr. Peringuey further 

 says that when he fii-st came to the South African Museum that 

 Institution jDossessed a. series of named Coleoptera presented by 

 these collectors, but the insects wei'e so damaged by Anthreni &c. 

 that they could not be pi-eserved. It is possible that some of the 

 types were destroyed among them. A son of Drege, the botanist, 

 is now living in Port Elizabeth, but he informed me that he had 

 no remembi'ance of his father's collections beyond that they had 

 been sold by auction by Thorey either in Altona or Hamburg. 

 Provided the labels have not been removed, the missing ty^^es 

 might yet be recognised, for Schonherr appears to have labelled 

 all the specimens which he returned to his correspondents. This 

 is only one example of the great disadvantage of the tendency to 

 hoard up type specimens in piivate collections, which are, for the 

 most part, liable to be dispersed upon the death of their ownei'S ; 

 the disappearance of the types often resulting in endless confusion 

 aiid unnecessary laboui- foi' futui'e workers. One could almost 

 wish that it might be possible to render it obligatory for the type, 

 or at least a co-type, of every species described in England to be 

 placed in the National Collection, in order to insure its accessibility 

 to all students. In the Coleoptera especially, the immense in- 

 crease every year in the number of described species should 

 emphasise the impoi-tance of attempting to simplify future 



