PtinidcB of the Canary Islands. 203 



April of 1859 I took it sparingly, both in the neighbourhood of 

 Arreciffe and Papagayo (of tlie former), and near Corralejo (in 

 the north of the latter). In almost every instance I found it 

 secreted (in company with the Piarus hasaJis, the Notiomimus 

 Jimicola, and a beautiftd Corynetes) within the dried dung of horses, 

 oxen and camels. 



Genus Ptinus. 

 Linnaeus, Syst. Nat. ii. oQ5 (1767). 

 The genus Ptinus, as now restricted, may be regarded, so far as 

 the parts of its moutli are concerned, as possessing the most ordi- 

 nary characters of the family, — which have been already pointed 

 out. In other details it may be known by its comparatively long 

 metasternum and less distant hinder coxse, by the penultimate 

 segment of its abdomen being usually much shortened, by its con- 

 spicuous scutellum and developed wings, by its posteriorly-con- 

 stricted and anteriorly-nodulose protliorax, by its elongate and 

 slender limbs, and by (most frequently) the dissimilarity of its 

 sexes. The Plini proper are insects which are more often at- 

 tached to articles of merchandize, and the dwellings of man, than 

 to the open country ; so that they have become more widely dif- 

 fused over the civilised world, through the medium of commerce 

 and by human agencies generally, than have the members of the 

 allied groups, — most of which (with the exception perhaps of 

 Mezium and Gibbium) are essentially independent in their modes of 

 life. 



7. Ptinus testaceus 1 Oliv. 

 P. ferrugineus, valde (prsesertim in prothorace) subsetuloso- 

 pubescens ; prothorace postice valde constricto ; scutello 

 albido-fulvescenti-squamoso ; elytris ellipticis, punctato- 

 striatis ; antennis pedibusque elongatis, gracilibus, parce 

 squamosis. 

 Long. Corp. lin. Ij. 

 Ptinus testaceusi Oliv., Ent. ix. 8 (1790). 



adoenal WolL, Ins. Mad. 261 (1854). 



testaceusi Id., Cat. Mad. Col, 89 (1857). 



— ? de Boield., Ann. de la Soc. Ent. de France 



(3ieme serie), iv. 654 (1857). 

 Habitat ins. Hierro; in domo quodam exemplar unicum (certe 

 introductum) collegi. 



I believe that the single specimen (a female) from which the 

 above diagnosis has been drawn-out is certainly identical with the 

 P. advena of the " Insecta Maderensia" (though I have not now 



