398 A YEAR IN BRAZIL. 



part of the body in one species, and in a totally different part in 

 nearly allied ones. I tried in vain to discover the use of these 

 curious brush-like decorations." 



I have already referred to the genera Chlamys and Poropleura 

 in my article on Mimicry. I may add under that head the geous 

 Batonota, which, like some of the Homoptera, resemble thorns. 



One other Brazilian beetle peculiar to Minas Geraes, to which 

 I must refer, is Hypocephalus armatus, Desm. The Rev. Hamlet 

 Clark,* in a letter from Constantia, Organ Mountains, in 1856, 

 writes : " Only three examples, I believe, are known of H. armatus, 

 or Anglice, the mole-cricket beetle, from its quaint resemblance to 

 a mole-cricket. Well, I had some drawings of this creature made 

 from the figure Mr. Smith gave me, and distributed them among 

 some lively-looking slaves here, with the promise of three milreis 

 (about six or seven shillings) for every specimen they would bring 

 me. But these negroes have such exuberant imaginations ! Yes, 

 they all had seen it, had seen it often, knew it well, one had found 

 it under rotten wood, another had seen it frequently in his planta- 

 tion, a third had seen it in the path only the other day ; but all 

 this is only talk (three milreis would be a fortune to any of them), 

 and no Hypocephalus has ever made its appearance." M. 

 Desmarest says,t " It is a most anomalous beetle of large size, from 

 the province of the mines in the interior of Brazil, whose natural 

 relations have perplexed all subsequent entomologists." Mr. J. 

 O. Westwood remarks, " The insect exhibits, as M. Desmarest 

 well observes, a certain analogy with the mole-cricket in the large 

 size of .the prothorax, thick hind legs, and short antennae." The 

 length of Mr. Westwood's specimen was three inches and half a 

 line long; he believed that this one was then (1845) the only one 

 existing in metropolitan cabinets. M. Desmarest's specimen was 

 two inches and one-fifth long ; • while that described by Gistl was 

 two inches and one-twelfth long. Mr. Westwood mentions 

 that a specimen was bought for the Paris Museum of Natural 

 History at the price of 700 francs. Professor Burmeister con- 

 siders " the curious animal Hypocephalus " to be a Longicom of 



* " Letters Home," p. 141. London, 1867. 



t " Guerin's Magazin de Zoologie," 1832, vol. i. p. 24. 



X ■' Arcana Entomologica, " vol. i. p. 35. London, 1S45. 



