500 Coleopterological Notices, VII. 



Cephenniini. 

 This tribe includes within our territories but one genus, con- 

 taining about five or six known species, of which three are here 

 described. These species are assignable to two subgenera. 



CEPHENJVIUM Miiller. 



Europe appears to be the headquarters of this very peculiar 

 and isolated genus, and the species occurring there outnumber 

 the American about six to one, as far as known at present. 

 There is no other type of the family approaching very near to 

 Cephennium in structure, but Neuraphes may be considered a 

 connecting bond with the Scydmsenini, and Eutheia with the 

 Chevrolatiini. 



The body is oblong-oval, generally strongly convex, with the 

 prothorax about as wide as the elytra, having its lateral edges 

 acute, the hypomera slightly concave, and the prosternum very 

 deeply emarginate through the width of the head and yerj short 

 before the coxse, differing very radically in this respect from Eu- 

 theia. The head is small, triangular and strongly deflexed, so- 

 that it is but slightly visible from aboTe, the neck altogether un- 

 constricted and deeply imbedded in the prothorax, and the eyes, 

 basal when present. Clypeus not separated from the front, the 

 labrum small, variable in form according to the subgenus. The 

 mandibles are generally stout, short and arcuate, and a compari- 

 son of them with those of Leptomastax, shows the most extreme- 

 divergence in form known in the family. Maxillary palpi with 

 the first three joints nearly as in Euconnini and Scydmsenini, but 

 with the fourth small, much more obscure and not subulate, short, 

 stout and obtuse in form and spongy in structure, projecting 

 axiallyfrom the apex of the third. Antennae very widely separa- 

 ted, situated at the sides of the head before the eyes and not so 

 frontal as in most other types of the famil^^ ; in our species the 

 club is incrassate and 3-jointed, the joints increasing rapidly in 

 thickness. 



The pronotum is devoid of coarse sculpture, except a feeble 

 and occasionallj' subfoveiform depression near each of the basal 

 angles. Scutellum relatively large, transverse and rounded. 

 Elj'tra generally a little wider near basal third or -| than at base, 

 the latter fitted closely to the thoracic base throughout the 

 width, the sides usuallj^^ more or less acute for a short distance 



