94 MIMICRY, AND OTHER PROTECTIVE 
There are a number of the larger tropical weevils 
which have the elytra and the whole covering of the 
body so hard as to be a great annoyance to the entomo- 
logist, because in attempting to transfix them the points 
of his pins are constantly turned. I have found it ne- 
cessary in these cases to drill a hole very carefully with 
the point of a sharp penknife before attempting to insert 
a pin. Many of the fine long-antennzd Anthribide (an 
allied group) have to be treated in the same way. We 
can easily understand that after small birds have in vain 
attempted to eat these insects, they should get to know 
them by sight, and ever after leave them alone, and it 
will then be an advantage for other insects which are 
comparatively soft and eatable, to be mistaken for them. 
We need not be surprised, therefore, to find that there 
are many Longicorns which strikingly resemble the. 
“hard beetles” of their own district. In South Brazil, 
Acanthotritus dorsalis is strikingly like a Curculio of the 
hard genus Heiliplus, and Mr. Bates assures me that he 
found Gymnocerus cratosomoides (a Longicorn) on the 
same tree with a hard Cratosomus (a weevil), which it 
exactly mimics. Again, the pretty Longicorn, Phacel- 
locera batesii, mimics one of the hard Anthribide of the 
genus Ptychoderes, having long slender antenne. In 
the Moluccas we find Cacia anthriboides, a small Longi- 
corn which might be easily mistaken for a very common 
species of Anthribide found in the same districts; and 
the very rare Capnolymma stygium closely imitates the 
common Mecocerus gazella, which abounded where it 
was taken. Doliops curculionoides and other allied 
