38 



ON THE CETONIID^ OF SOUTH AFRICA. 



the editor of a late edition of Drury's work. Fabricius, Olivier, Lamarck, and Klug, have all confounded 

 the two foregoing species, and made them one, although the two first entomologists must have seen both 

 specimens, although the original describer suspected them to be distinct ; and although they will to the 

 eye of any modern entomologist who inspects them, appear totally different from each other. The 

 bifurcation of the extremity of the clypeus in the male, is of a different form from that of Goliathus 

 Drurii, inasmuch as the latter is curved backwards so as to resemble the Greek letter Y, whereas in 

 G. giganteiis it resembles more the letter Y. The marking, colour, and size, are also so different, that 

 one is really amused to find Klug, in a late publication,* gravely laying down a theory to account for the 

 two unique insects of Drury's Collection forming only one species. It is true that he never saw them ; 

 but he read in Drury's work that the former of these species {Goliathus Drurii,) was found dead, and 

 floating on the surface of the river Gaboon. Catching at this fact, in the " Verzeichniss von Thieren und 

 Pflcmzen," which were collected by Adolph Erman in his voyage round the world, Klug says that the 

 identity of the two species being fully proved by Drury's figures, which represent the clypeus porrected 

 in both beetles, and the colouring of the thorax not essentially distinct, no regard ought to be paid 

 by us to the very different colouring of the elytra, since the specimen figured by Drury, vol. i. t. 31., 

 having been found dead in the water, may have lost its original white covering, and may thus appear to us 

 now of a brown colour. Such reasoning is certainly ingenious, but the colouring of the thorax is very 

 distinct, and, I will venture to say, that the clypeus will be found bifid and porrected even in the male 

 of G. regius when known ; and besides, I have pointed out sufficient differences to make it certain that 

 Drury was right when he suspected his two unique specimens to belong to different species. I am not 

 much inclined to adopt Lamarck's trivial name giganteus" because he applied it to both species, 

 G. Drurii and this ; nor can I adopt Klug's trivial name " imperialis" for, in fact this is in like 

 manner applied by its author to an imaginary being, made up of the two foregoing species united, 

 which, be it observed, neither he nor Lamarck ever saw. In my specimen of G. giganteus there are two 

 small black spots on the hinder part of the thorax which is quite white, the two middle vittse being 

 abbreviated. In the other specimen which I have seen, the two middle black vittas reach to the hinder 

 margin of the thorax, and the two small black spots above mentioned become connected with the other 

 vittse on each side. Mr. Kirby, in his Introduction to Entomology, vol. iv. p. 506, alludes to some 

 private letter of mine to him, in which mention was made of Goliathus giganteus. I suppose, there- 

 fore, that at the time of writing that letter, I assigned the name which Lamarck has given both to 

 G. Drurii and this, to the latter species alone. 



Sp. (Cetoninus) Goliathus Cacicus, Oliv. 



Descr. Goliathus niger, thorace flavescente vittis sex abbreviatis nigris, exterioribus brevioribus, 

 scuteUo flavo, elytris albido-glaucis margine maculaque humerali subtriangulari nigris. 

 $ Clypeo albo lateribus unidentatis, dente lato truncate, cornu medio porrecto bifido ramis nigris 



divergentibus apice dilatatis oblique truncatis. 

 $ Incognita. 



Scarabceus Cacicus, Voet. Col. tab. 22. fig. 151. 

 Cetonia Cacicus, Oliv. tab. 3. fig. 22. 



Long. corp. 3 Inches 6 lines. 

 Note. This insect, Hke the last, is truly from Africa, as Professor Klug perceived. The first 

 describers of it, however, made it to be an American species, and so dubbed it " a Cacique." The 

 original specimen is said to be at Glasgow in the Hunterian Museum. I believe Mr. Hope possesses one 

 in spirits, and I have seen another in the National Museum at Paris. Of this last we have an excellent 

 figure given by M. Gory. Goliathus giganteus comes exactly between this species and G. regius, for if 

 we look at the marking of the thorax, we find G. giganteus to agree with G. Cacicus, and if we look at 



* Reise um die Erde ausgefuhrt von Adolph Erman. 



