ON DECOMPOSED VEGETABLE MATTER, 57 



form with the hind-legs proceeding from a transverse 

 moveable trochanter, and placed so near the hinder extre- 

 mity of the body, and so far fi-om each other, as to give 

 the insect in walking the most awkward appearance pos- 

 sible. This peculiar fonnation is nevertheless particularly 

 serviceable to its possessors, in rolling the balls of excre- 

 mentitious matter in which they inclose their eggs. 



Proceeding upon the data which I have been able to 

 collect, it may be said that the tropical Scarabmdce are to 

 those from without the tropics nearly as 5 : 1. Out of 450 

 species and upwards in my father's collection, only nine are 

 natives of England ; and of these nine, no less than eight 

 are Onthophagi, which I consider as composing an extreme 

 genus of the family, not the less interesting fi-om having 

 been noticed by PUny^. 



Fam. III. APHODIID^. 



Antennae articuUs novem, capite paulo longiores ; 



Articulo primo elongato, alioriim conjunctim vix Ion- 



gitudine, cylindrico, ad apicem paulo crassiore ; se- 



cundo hemisphczrico ; 

 Capitulo subgloboso-ovato, triphyllo. 

 Labrum sub chjpeo latitans, membranaceum, margine an- 



tko vix ciliato, medio subacuto. 

 Mandibulse clypeo obtectce, ad basin cornea, deinde in la- 



minam brevem, compressam, dilatatam, coriaceam 



aut vix membranaceam products ; latere interna et 



apice haudfimbriatis, 



* "Tauri vocantur Scarabsei terrestres, ricino similes j nomen cornicuTa 

 ^edere. Alii pediculos terrse vocant." ¥\\n. Hiit. Nat, lib. xxx, c, 12. 



