30 Notes on Australian Coleoptera. 
less perceptible than in the ear-trumpet just described, if 
indeed in this latter it is even possible to perceive any 
difference. 
One of the first medical men in this city has tried this 
stethoscope, and remarked the great increase of sound it con- 
veyed ; he also considered it would be most valuable for 
those members of the medical profession whose hearing was 
rather defective in detecting stethoscopic sounds. 
I have not had any experience in stethoscopy, so must 
therefore submit this instrument to medical men to judge of 
its efficiency. 
ArT. V.—Notes on Australian Coleoptera. - 
By Count F. DE CASTELNAU.: 
’ (Read by Dr. Mueller, 12th November, 1866.) 
No. 1. Cricendelider. 
One of the most remarkable facts connected with the 
distribution of animals in Australia, is certainly the absence 
of the cicindelide in all the southern part of that Con- 
tinent ; that family of insects being otherwise spread over 
_all the regions of the globe capable of bearing animal life. 
This fact is just as interesting as is the absence of ophidian 
reptiles in New Zealand and New Caledonia. 
Little, or nearly nothing, is yet. known of the entomolo- 
gical fauna of the northern and north western territories ; 
but the eastern coast, which has been studied with some 
care, presents a certain number of cicindelide, among which 
we find with surprise the Megacephala, a form believed till 
lately to be peculiar to the warmest parts of Africa, which 
bare, we must remember, a considerable resemblance with 
the central regions of Australia, to which it is confined on 
this continent. . 
An allied genus, Tetracha, had also been long ago signalised 
by Hope from specimens brought from Port Essington. 
Since then other species have been found by Messrs. Masters 
and Thouzet, at Port Denison and Rockhampton, and also 
by Mr. Waterhouse, in the central parts of Australia, during 
his expedition across the continent, under Mr. Stuart. 
Distipsidera is common in most parts of Queensland, the 
species being very nearly allied to those which inhabit in 
ereat numbers New Caledonia and the neighbouring islands. 
