3 
vious writers. Although a faunistic work^ it comprehended here 
and there the results of the examination of genera found in 
other parts of the world. The treatise of M. Thomson consists 
of an application of Leconte’s classification to the Longicornes 
in general. Both these essays^ however^ leave much to be de- 
sired, for reasons to be mentioned presently. The only other 
works which contain considerable modifications of the system of 
Latreille are Mulsant’s ^Coleopteres de France (Longicornes)/ 
1839, and Blanchard’s ^ Histoire des Insectes,’ 1845. The 
former, although containing an excellent analysis of the species 
and genera found in France, added little that could be applied 
to the family generally. The latter proposed a number of sub- 
tribes, but with insufficient and inapplicable characters, and 
without any review of the genera comprehended under them. 
Leconte divided each of the tribes of Latreille into a number 
of subordinate groups, characterized after a searching examina- 
tion of the whole external structure of the insects. It is doubt- 
ful, however, whether his groups can be all maintained : the 
classification is open to much objection, and, I think, will require 
considerable emendation before being applied generally. The 
important discovery of a very constant character for the tribe 
Lamiaires, viz. the existence of an oblique groove on the inner 
side of the fore tibise, is due to Zimmerman, who first called 
attention to it. The existence of a smaller similar groove sur- 
mounted by a tubercle on the outer side of the middle tibise, in 
most of the divisions of the same tribe, was not mentioned. 
The form of the anterior acetabula, or sockets of the fore 
haunches, is employed too rigorously : it is a constant character 
in some groups of Lamiaires, being a good guide, for instance, 
in distinguishing the Colobothese from the true Saperditse, with 
which they had been confounded by all previous authors ; but it 
separates Acanthoderes and its allies too widely from Oreodera^ 
Dryoctenes, and similar genera, with which they are in all other 
characters closely connected. In fact, some of these genera are 
extremely variable in this character. The form of the anterior 
acetabula depends upon how far the suture which runs from 
their external rim to the line which separates thepronotum from 
the pectus is opened or closed. This suture seems to be that 
which separates the episternum from the epimera, and, according 
to the shape or manner of action of the fore haunches, it is 
either quite closed, more or less gaping near the rim of the 
socket, partly closed but not gaping at its commencement, or 
widely opened along its whole length. The shape of the aceta- 
bula in the Prionidee was noticed long before the date of Le- 
conte’s treatise, viz. by the Marquis Maximilian Spinola, in a 
paper published in 1842. In this tribe, where the breast is very 
B 2 
