PtinidcB of the Canary Islands. 205 



most remarkable feature, namely that the extreme base of its 

 elytra is densely fringed with a row of minute pads of closely-set 

 scales. 



Genus Nitpus. (PI. VIII. fig. 5.) 

 Jacq. Du Val, Glan. Entom. 13S (1860). 

 Corpus parvum, elytris subglobosis,parce squamosum (sed haud 

 pilosum), apterum : ccuUs parvis, subrotundatis, paulo pro- 

 minulis : prolhorace aequali, subcylindrico (ad basin vix con- 

 stricto) : scutel/ohaud observando : elytris connatis : metasterno 

 brevi, postice (inter coxas posticas) facile et leviter arcuato : 

 abdominis segmento /penull'imo brevissimo. Antennce fere ut in 

 Casapo, sed (in utroque sexu) 9-articulatae. Instrumenta 

 cibaria (5a, 5 b, 5 c, 5d) fere ut in Dignomo, Ptino et caet., sed 

 menti lobo centrali (5d) paulo angustiore. Pedes longiusculi, 

 subrobusti ; antici sub-approximati, intermedii paulo dis- 

 tantiores, postict valde distantes : femoribiis subclavatis: tars'is 

 crassiusculis, articulis 4 basalibus gradatim leviter decre- 

 scentibus ; posl'icism sexu masculo (5e) 4-articulatis, art, Imo 

 longiusculo. 



Obs. — Genus in structura antennarum tarsorumque mascu- 

 lorum posticorum inter Ptinidas abnormale, sed in reliquis 

 rainutiis cum Sphcerico fere omnino congruens. 



The genus Nitpus was established lately by M. Jacquelin Duval 

 for the reception of a small member of the present family which is 

 common in Teneriffe, and which so closely counterfeits at first 

 sight my Sphcericiis atbopictus, from Madeira, and its near Canarian 

 ally the 6'. simplex, that, until examining it minutely, I had inad- 

 vertently mixed it up with specimens of the latter insect. After 

 a careful dissection of these species, and an accurate comparison 

 of their several parts, they appear to me to be almost identical in 

 every respect, except that in Nitpus the antennae and hinder male- 

 feet have their joints numerically reduced, — those of the former 

 (in both sexes) being merely nine and those of the \atter four. In 

 the rest of their structural details I can detect nodiflPerences worth 

 mentioning,* — their various oral organs, as well as the form of 

 their metasterna, abdominal segments, and basally-distant pos- 

 terior coxae, being similar ; nevertheless the primary importance 



* The upper-lip in Nitpus is perhaps a little more pilose in front, and just per- 

 ceptibly rounder at the sides; the shoulder-like slipes of the maxillae is not quite 

 so square at its apex, and the terminal joint of the palpi is possibly a trifle less 

 elongate; but such small differences (which are but barely appreciable) cannot 

 be of more than specific importance. 



