14 MR. A. MURRAY ON THE GEO GRAPHICAL RELATIONS OF 



Laparocerus is another special new development confined to 

 them, but present in most of them in greater or lesser numbers ; 

 thus in Madeira there are thirteen species, in the Canaries thirty- 

 five species, none in the Cape Verdes, where, however, Dinas, 

 a new Brachyderidous insect, similar to it in appearance, comes 

 either to take its place or that of Brachyderes, which is also 

 found in some of the Atlantic groups. In the Clavicorns, the 

 remarkable genus Tarphius, a consideration of whose relations 

 would require space which cannot be given here, characterizes 

 the Canaries and Madeira, as Attains does in the Malacodermata. 



As to the Azores, Mr. Crotch has completed Wollaston's work 

 for him there. As a matter of sentiment, one would have liked to 

 have seen the whole finished by Mr. Wollaston himself, as he had 

 done so much and so well ; but the naturalist is rather un- 

 grateful in this respect, and cares little how he gets his know- 

 ledge, provided he does get it. Mr. Crotch's contribution there- 

 fore (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1867) is a welcome, as it is a trustworthy 

 and careful, record of the Coleoptera of the Azores. His mate- 

 rials are, indeed, far less complete than Wollaston's in the other 

 islands ; but although imperfect as regards proportions, they suf- 

 ficiently reveal the character of the fauna. Mr. Crotch records 

 213 species, of which 160 are European ; and among those not 

 European, he describes a Tarphius, a Laparocerus, an Attalus, an 

 Acalles, and a new member of the Cossonidse — all sufficient 

 indications of the Azores being a member of the same system as 

 the other Atlantic islands. How the European character of this 

 general fauna is to be accounted for, except on the supposition 

 of a former connexion of them all with Europe, and how the 

 presence of these special forms of the same subfauna in all the 

 islands, and nowhere else, is to be accounted for except on the 

 supposition that, after they were disunited from Europe, they 

 were still united among themselves, it is for those who advocate 

 the theory of dispersal by chance introductions to say. 



The Azores seem to occupy nearly the western extremity of 

 this ancient land ; not far beyond them a deep valley, the deepest 

 part of the Atlantic, intervenes between them and the coast of 

 America. Up this the G-ulf-stream scours, as it probably has 

 done from early days far back in geological time ; and if there is 

 any place in the world to which we might reasonably expect a 

 few waifs and strays to be brought by currents, it would be the 

 Azores ; and yet there are only three in this position, all Brazilian 



