85 
towards the base. In one section^ however, the spines are more 
or less distant from the hind angles, and they then have the 
acute tips and recurved shape of the thoracic spines of Leiopus ; 
so that this character is not wholly to be relied on. The flatness 
of the thorax and the great slenderness of the antennse are per- 
haps distinctive characters of more value. The species are pret- 
tily variegated in the hues of the fine pubescence with which 
they are clothed; and the group, whether treated as a section of 
Leiopus or as an independent genus, appears to me a very natural 
one*. 
§ 1. Thoracic spines very near to, or coincident with, the hind angles ; 
small, not curved posteriorly. 
1. Lepturges elegantulus, n. sp. 
L. subellipticus, depressus, carneo-fulvus, fusco variegatus : elytris 
oblique et obtuse truncatis : femoribus posticis vix clavatis, tarsis 
maxime elongatis. Long. 3| lin. S . 
Head pinkish tawny. Antennse the same, with the extreme 
tips of all the joints dusky ; they are filiform, or rather stout, 
and nearly three times the length of the body ( c? ). Thorax with 
the lateral spines nearly coincident with the hind angles, porrect 
* The genus Leiopus is represented by three European species, one only 
of which {L.nehulosus) I have been able to examine. Leconte enumerates 
several North- American species, and, according to the characters he gives 
of the genus, these seem to agree generically with the European forms ; 
but one (L. angulatus of Georgia) would appear rather to belong to our 
new genus Lepturges. The chief fea.tures enumerated by Leconte as dis- 
tinguishing Leiopus from the many allied genera are — (1) the shortness 
and conical shape of the ovipositor of the females (to which may be added 
the uncleft tip of the apical ventral segment which forms part of it), 
(2) the rounded apex of the dorsal plate of the apical abdominal segment 
in the males, (3) the naked antennse, and (4) the elongation of the basal 
joint of the posterior tarsi. I propose to limit the genus to those species 
which have, in addition to the above characters, the thorax of quadrate 
outline and of more or less convex shape, with the lateral spines placed at 
a distance from the hind angles, long, acute, and curved posteriorly. I did 
not meet with a single species answering to this definition in the Amazons 
region : the following, however, found in South-east Brazil, seems to be a 
tme Leiopus, with the exception of the antennae being long and slender, 
and furnished with stiff hairs ; — 
L. amcenulus. Oblongus, convexiusculus, tomento carneo-griseo laete varie- 
gatus. Caput nigrum, vertice rufo. Antennae elongatae, tenues, setiferae, 
rufo-piceae, articulis (duobus basalibus exceptis) apice nigris. Thorax 
subquadratus, convexus, spinis lateralibus pone medium sitis, acutis, 
recurvis; tomento carneo-griseo vestitus, maculis duabus dorsalibus 
claviformibus nigris. Elytra apice breviter et obtuse truncata, modice 
convexa, punctata, nigricantia, utrinque plaga irregulari ab humero 
usque ad apicem extensa grisea, nigro quadrimaculata, apud humeros 
roseo tincta ornata. Corpus subtus rufo-piceum. Pedes picei, femori- 
bus omnibus valde clavatis. Long. 2 lin. J . Hub. Rio Janeiro 
Brasilise. Coll. Bakewell, Bates. 
