PL AT YPS YLLlDiE . ■ 



, — CLAYICORNIA. 



95 



abnormal of all the Coleoptera. It was discovered in 1868 on a 

 dead American Beaver in the Zoological Gardens of Rotterdam, 

 and was at first believed to be a suctorial insect, related to the 

 PulicidtE ; it also shows some points of resemblance with the 

 Mallophaga, or Biting Lice. Westwood considered it to form a 

 separate order altogether, which he called Achreioptera, but it is 

 certainly a beetle, though an anomalous one. The mandibles 

 indeed are rudimentary, but the maxillae are well dev eloped and 

 quite Coleopterous ; its Coleopterous nature is also proved by its 

 larva, which is elongate, moderately broad, narrower in front and 

 behind, with the short cerci at the apex, which are a little longer 

 than the stout anal appendage between them ; it resembles certain 

 of the Staphylinid larva) and has the same kind of motion, but it 

 is perhaps most closely related to the larvae of the Silphid.e. 



Very little is known of the life-history of the insect, except 

 that it has been found on the Beaver, alive and dead, in Europe 

 and America. Whether it is carnivorous, feeding on other smaller 

 parasitic insects on the Beaver, or whether it feeds chiefly on 

 exudations from the skin or on the scales of the epithelium is 

 not known ; the rudimentary mandibles would seem to favour the 

 latter view. 



In its habits Platypsyllus is related to Lepthms. Leconte 

 considers these genera closely related, through the formation of 

 the mentum, but there is little in common between the trilobed 

 mentum of the former, and the undivided, though certainly 

 abnormal form of that organ in the latter. 



The family is here included under the Staphyltnoidea for 

 convenience' sake, and because of its relation to the iSiLPEXDiE ; 

 as the insect is apterous there is no venation to be considered. 



Division 2. CLAVICORNIA. 



In the third volume of his work (Die Kafer von Mitteleuropa, 

 in, p. 409) Granglbauer assigns the following families to the 

 Clayicorinya : — ISph^ritid^;, Ostomid.e (TrogositidyE), Bytu- 



RIDiE, NrTIDULLCLE, PvSSANDRIDiE*, CUCUJID.E, EBOITLID.E, PhA- 

 LACRIEvE, ThORICTID.E, DERODOXTIDiE, LATHRIDIID.E, MyCETO- 



PBAGEDiE, Colydiid.e, Enuomychid^;, and Coccinellid.e ; at the 

 beginning of the fourth volume (Band I, p. 2) he further includes 

 the families Dermestid.e, Byrrhld.e, Nosodendeid.e, G-eorys- 

 sidve, Dryopid.e (Parniu^e), Heteroceriile, and Hydrophilie.e, 

 but he only does this quite provisionally, and expresses his belief 

 that the first of these groups at all events ought to come at the 

 end of the Diversicornia, and therefore after the Serricorkca 

 instead of before them. In this he is probably right, as it is more 

 likely that the Ceayicornia are derived from the Serricor^ia 

 than the reverse ; but the Staphyehstoieea are so closely allied to 



* Ganglbauer subsequently (7. c. iii, p. 565) includes this family under the 



CuCUJID.E. 



