THE LEPTUKIANS. 115 



to them, signifying really narrow tail. They differ from the 

 other Capricorn-beetles in the form of their eyes, which are 

 not deeply notched, but are either oval or rounded and prom- 

 inent, and the antennas are more distant from them, and are 

 implanted near the middle of the forehead. Moreover, the 

 head is not deeply sunk in the fore part of the thorax, but is 

 connected with it by a narrowed neck. The thorax varies 

 somewhat in shape, but is generally narrowed before and 

 widened behind. The Lepturians are often gayly colored, 

 and fly about by day, visiting flowers for the sake of the 

 pollen and tender leaves, which they eat. Their grubs live 

 in the trunks and stumps of trees, are rather broad and 

 somewhat flattened, and are mostly furnished with six ex- 

 tremely short legs. 



The largest and finest of these beetles in New England is 

 the Desmocerus palliatus,* (Plate II. Fig. 18,) which appears 

 on the flowers and leaves of the common elder towards the 

 end of June and until the middle of July. It is of a deep 

 violet or Prussian-blue color, sometimes glossed with green, 

 and nearly one half of the fore part of the wing-covers is 

 orange-yellow, suggesting the idea of a short cloak of this 

 color thrown over the shoulders, which the name palliatus, 

 that is, cloaked, was designed to express. The head is nar- 

 row. The thorax has nearly the form of a cone cut off at 

 the top, being narrow before and wide behind ; it is somewhat 

 uneven, and has a little sharp projecting point on each side 

 of the base. The antennas have the third and the three fol- 

 lowing joints abruptly thickened at the extremity, giving 

 them the knotty appearance indicated by the generical name 

 Desmocerus, which signifies knotty horn. The larvae live in 

 the lower part of the stems of the elder, and devour the pith ; 

 they have hitherto escaped my researches, but I have found 

 the beetles in the burrows made by them. 



The bark of the pitch-pine is often extensively loosened by 

 the grubs of Lepturians at work beneath it, in consequence. 



* Cerambyx palliatus of Forster; Sienocorus cyanetis, Fabricius. 

 15* 



