Dr. Schaum on the British Geodephaga. 33 



native collectors the comparatively few species of the scanty Bri- 

 tish fauna, are not sufficient for the entomologists of the conti- 

 nent, who have a richer field before them. Recognition from 

 descriptions, besides, becomes still more difficult, because insects 

 which are represented by English writers under names given by 

 Gyllenhal, Dejean, or other authors, are frequently incorrectly 

 determined, and consequently cannot serve as starting-points for 

 the settlement of the other species. An interchange of specimens 

 has not yet been successfully introduced, for most of the English 

 collectors, induced by the insular position of Great Britain, con- 

 fine themselves entirely to the investigation of their own fauna, 

 and usually feel no interest whatever in continental insects. 



A two months^ residence in London gave me the opportunity 

 of seeing the collection of Mr. J. F. Stephens frequently, and 

 as the most liberal permission to make use of it was granted to 

 me by the kind owner, I resolved to investigate thoroughly some 

 families contained in it, considering this more advantageous 

 than collecting notes on individual species of diff^ereut families. 

 I chose Carabici and Hydrocanthari, with which I am most con- 

 versant, and in which I promised myself most success. I should 

 willingly have investigated some other groups, such as the Elaters 

 and a part of the Palpicornes ; but my stay in London was too 

 short, and my time too much occupied to admit of this ; and be- 

 sides, I dreaded making erroneous statements in many cases, from 

 the impossibility of now and then comparing correctly deter- 

 mined specimens of German species. 



It is to be wished that English entomologists, following Wal- 

 ton's example, would set themselves to the task (and attend to it 

 closely) of studying individual families, so as to bring about in 

 them an agreement between the English nomenclature and that 

 employed on the continent. Walton's laborious works on the 

 British Curculionidse are published in Taylor's ' Annals of Na- 

 tural History,' and I hope the ' Entomologische Zeitung ' may 

 soon give us translations of his last essays. 



I will now go through the genera of Carabici in their order. 



Cicindela sylvicola. — The specimen figured by Curtis, which is in 

 the collection of Mr. J. F. Stephens, is a green variety of C. hybrida, 

 Dej. The true C. sylvicola, Dej., is not indigenous in England. 



Dromius fenestratus, Ste., is not fenestratus, Fab., Dej., but a va- 

 riety of D. testaceus, Erichs., with a yellow spot on the anterior half 

 of the elytra *. The type of the latter species is mixed with D. agilis 

 in Stephens's collection under the names of D. agilis and meridio- 

 nalis. 



D. bipennifer is Sigma, Rossi, Dej. ; D. impunctatus belongs to 



* This variety is described by Dejean, i. p. 242, as D. agilis, var. a. 

 Ann. ^ Mac/. N. Hist. Ser. 2. Vol. in. 3 



