182 Mr. T. Vernon Wollaston on the Euphorbia- infesthig 



Fam. HALTICID^. 



Genus Haltica. 



GeofFroy, Hist. Abr. des Ins. de Paris, i. 244 (1762). 



38. Haltica Paivana,* Woll. 



//. ovato-oblonga, nitida, profiinde dense et rugose punctata, 

 laete nietallica (modo cyanea, modo viridi-cyanea, modo- 

 seneo-cuprea) ; prothorace transverso-subquadrato, ad latera 

 marginato subrotundato, angulis ipsis posticis leviter promi- 

 nulis acutiusculis; antennarum basi pedibnsque rufo-testaceis, 

 antennis versus apicem, femoribus anterioribus ad basin, fe- 

 moribus posticis omnino, necnon tarsorum apicibus plus 

 minus nigrescentibvis. 



Mas vix minor, oculis magis prominulis tarsprumque anteriorum 

 articulo basilari paulo dilatato. 



Variat (seneo-cuprea) pedibus in utroque sexu omnino pallidis. 



Long. Corp. lin. 1 — 1|. 



Haltica Paivana, Wol-l., Journ. of Ent. i. 2 (1860). 



Habitat in ins. Lanzarota, Canaria, TenerifFa et Hierro, folia 

 Euphorbiarura destruens. 



The present insect is the only one included in this memoir which 

 is attached to the foliage of the Euphorbias, all the others being 

 found strictly within the rotten stems ; and indeed I should not 

 have admitted the H, Paivana into it, were it not apparently quite 

 peculiar to those singular plants. I need scarcely add, that 

 numerous flower-resorting Coleoptera (such as Anaspis, Dasytes 

 and Attains) ttiay be found accidentally on the Euphorbias ; 

 but such are mere chance visitors, and have no more connection 

 with the plants than with any other members of the Canarian 

 flora: but since the present Haltica is purely o( " Euphorbia- 

 infesting habits," I cannot properly omit it from the Paper. It is, 

 as I stated in my enumeration of the Halticidce of these islands 

 published in the first number of the " Journal of Entomology," 

 " a nnetallic species of very variable colour, shading-ofF from bright 

 cyaneous-blue into golden-green, and almost, at times, into 

 coppery-brown." It was taken by Mr. Gray and myself, during 

 January, 1858, in the north of Lanzarote (iu which locality I again 

 captured it, after a year's interval) ; as also, by myself, in Grand 

 Canary (on the mountains above San Martao), TenerifFe (near 

 Laguna, Orotava and Santa Cruz), and (in the district of El GolfoJ 

 on the west of Hierro. 



