PAUSSIDJE. 



67 



Family 8. PAUSSID^. 



General form rectangular, more or less depressed, very rarely sub- 

 cylindrical ; antennae, extremely variable, usually tivo-jointed, some- 

 times six- or ten-jointed, in one genus eleven-jointed, usually of 

 extraordinary form; elytra truncate behind,, with the pygidium 

 usually exposed ; tarsi five-jointed ; wings with Adephagid venation, 

 \the areola oblong a being distinct. 



Owing chiefly to the very variable, strange, and abnormal develop- 

 ment of the antennas, and their general facies, the Paussid^e present 

 some of the most extraordinary forms among the Coleoptera, and 

 there has been considerable difference of opinion regarding their 

 true position; as loug ago as 1844 Bnrmeister placed them among 

 the Adepkaga, next to the Carabine, but Lacordaire excluded 

 them from the group and placed them between the Palpicopjstes 

 (Cercyon) and the Staphylinldes. Before this time Latreille 

 classed them with the Scolytid^e and BosxnYCHiDJi, and West- 

 wood, although not committing himself definitely, seems to have 

 inclined towards placing them near the CucujidvE. Raftray (Nouv. 

 Arch. Mus. Paris (2) ix, pp. 354-359) discusses the whole question 

 at length , and comes to the conclusion that they are a very well- 

 marked abnormal group, not intimately connected with any other, 

 but with closer affinities to the Carabine than to any other family. 

 Sharp agrees with Raffray, but places the family at the beginning 

 of his third great series Polymorpha, and not with the Carabid^e. 

 Desneux, the most recent writer on the group ( 4 G-enera Insectorum,' 

 Patjssid.e. p. 3, 1905), considers the question as definitely settled 

 by the researches of Raffray and, more recently, of Escherich. 

 "Not only," he says, " have the PausseDtE more analogies with the 

 Carabidjb than with any other family, but they are intimately 

 united with them, for they are derived directly from them, their 

 ancestors being found in a group akin to the Oz^enidje, which, as 

 Rattray has pointed out, have numerous characters common also to 

 the Paussid^:." We can hardly, perhaps, consider the matter as 

 quite settled, but the discovery of the genus PrQtopaussus, with its 

 eleven-jointed simple antenna?, added to other considerations, leads 

 us to believe that the family must be given at all events a somewhat 

 more than provisional place among the Adephaga. 



The genera and species are very widely distributed throughout 

 tropical and subtropical countries, and are well represented in 

 India ; as the Indian species are treated of in this volume, we need 

 not here say more about them. 



e 2 



