" The only explanation that occurs to me of the error into which 

 Baron von Mueller was no doubt led by some non-entomological friend 

 is this, that a moth had deposited her eggs upon or near a cluster of 

 old and empty galls, and the young caterpillars had appropriated the 

 galls to their own purposes. There are quantities of Lepidopterous 

 larvaB under the dead bark or in chinks and cracks of every gum tree, 

 and for many of the smaller kinds the cavity of the gall withi the 

 orifice enlarged would prove a very convenient place for pupation." 



Adelaide : March 23rd, 1887. 



ON A NEW aSNUS OF EROTYLIBM. 

 BY GEORGE LEWIS, F.L.S. 



In vol. sx of the Ent. Mo. Mag., p. 138 (1883), I described a 

 species of the above Family as Episcaplia perforata, but I find now, 

 on a further study of the group and of tbree similar species from 

 Japan, that the insect requires a genus to be formed for its I'ecep- 

 tion. And I also see that the four Japanese species are congeneric 

 with MegaJodacne JJlJcei, Croteh, and it is tbis last named species that 

 I now propose to treat of as tbe type of the genus Microster7ius. 



The chief characteristics of Microsfernus are, in the first place, 

 the very narrow, almost inconspicuous, transverse mesosternum, and 

 in the second the form of the pi'osternum. The presternum is, as 

 stated by Crotch (Trans. Amer. Ent. Soc, p. 353, 1873, as a specific 

 character of 3Iegalodacne UlJcei), I'aised and triangular. The narrow 

 and transverse mesosternum of Microsternus points to an alliance with 

 Aulacocliilus, and so also does the form of the prosternum. The 

 sternal plates of 3Iicrosternus Ulkei are represented here by fig. 1, 

 and fig. 2, given for comparison, shows the outlines of AulacocliiJus 

 violaceus, Germ. 



fig. 1 fig. 2 



MegaJodacne and Episca})ha are closely allied genera, but both 

 have a mesosternal structure which is conspicuous between the middle 

 coxfe, and this character separates them in a very marked degree from 



