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;among the true Melolonthides, the latter in a group which 

 was separated by him under the name Tanyproctini. Com- 

 paring the very brief diagnoses of the genera one finds that 

 they are distinguished from each other by the number of 

 joints (six and seven) in the antennal nabellum and by the 

 presence in Holophylla (but not in Rlwpcea) of complete 

 ventral sutures. The former of these characters is of no 

 value at all ; its acceptance would involve breaking up 

 Rhopcea into five genera, in which the species most closely 

 allied would be generically separated. Burmeister in 185§ 

 stated that Holophylla has not complete ventral sutures — a 

 statement that no doubt is correct in respect of the insect 

 which he (Burmeister) regarded as Holophylla and named 

 II . furfuracea — and that it is one of the true Melolonthides. 

 But he does not appear to have had good authority for hie 

 identification. His remarks are too long to be quoted at full 

 length here, but they imply his not having before him the 

 actual specimen on which Erichson founded his genus ; more- 

 over, if he had had that specimen before him it seems most 

 unlikely that he would not have described it and given i% 

 a specific name as being Erichson's type. At the time Bur- 

 meister wrote there was no Australian species known (apart 

 from the undescribed species called Holophylla) of Melolon- 

 thides having transverse front coxae and complete ventral 

 sutures, and therefore a mistake on Erichson's part appeared 

 the less unlikely, but since that time a genus has been 

 described by Olliff (Othnonius) on a single species (0. Bated) 

 of which I have examples before me, and which undoubtedly 

 falls (in Erichson's classification) in the Tanyproctini where 

 he placed Holophylla — it having transverse front coxae and 

 complete ventral sutures, and might very well be the species 

 that Erichson called Holophylla were it not for the generic- 

 ally valueless difference that its antennal flabellum has only- 

 six joints. It seems so unlikely that an author of Erichson's 

 ability and reputation would definitely place a Melolonthid 

 among those having complete ventral sutures (a very easily 

 observed character), when that was not the case with it, as 

 to suggest the probability of Burmeister's having been incor- 

 rect in his conjecture that the species he described as Holo- 

 phylla is congeneric with Erichson's Holophylla, and the 

 probability of the insect for which Erichson founded that 

 genus being generically identical with, or very near to, that 

 for which Olliff at a later date proposed the name Othnonius. 

 To this must be added a very serious discrepancy between 

 Erichson's and Burmeister's descriptions of the claws of Holo- 

 phylla. Erichson says of them that they have "a single 

 ttooth at the base," distinguishing them from those of genera 



