150 NORTHERN ZOOLOGY. 



(201) 1. # Elater (Aphotistus) /eripemnis. Bronze-winged E. Aphotistus. 



t 



E. A. (ccripennisj atcr ; clytiis aneis nitidis ,• antennis pedibusque piceis ; prothorace obscuro, obsolete canaliculato, confertissime 



punctata. 

 Bronze-winged E. Aphotistus, very black; elytra bronzed shining; antenna; and legs piceous: prothorax not glossed, 



obsoletely channelled and very thickly punctured. 



Length of the body 6 lines. 



Several taken in Lat. 54°. Cumberland-house. 



DESCRIPTION. 



Body very black, without hairs, underneath very minutely punctured. Head thickly and conflu- 

 ently punctured ; nose with two slight impressions : antennae shorter than the prothorax, third joint 

 longer than the fourth : prothorax very thickly punctured, obsoletely channelled, longer than wide, 

 rather narrowest before, sides curving, posterior angles acute, diverging, carinated : scutellum heart- 

 shaped: elytra bronzed, or green-bronzed ; furrowed, furrows punctured; interstices convex, minutely 

 punctured ; tips acute : a discoidal rufous spot or band, and sometimes two, marks the underside of 

 the abdomen : legs piceous. 



This species is the American representative of E. impressus, from which it differs principally in 

 being smaller, narrower in proportion, with the head and prothorax not at all bronzed, and the latter 

 more thickly punctured and without any gloss. 



Family BUPRESTID^E. Buprestidans. 



This splendid family, as well as the preceding, has been very little studied. Mr. 

 Curtis has proved from the examination of two species, 4 that their oral organs 

 differ, and probably many of the groups are similarly circumstanced. Latreille 

 has divided the family into two sections, those that have not and those that have a 

 scutellum. 5 Buprestis Gigas, one belonging to the latter family, may be regarded 

 as the original type of the genus. 



* Curtis. Brit. Ent. i, t. xxxi, ii, t. Ixvii. 5 Crust. Araclm. et Ins. i, 44G. 



