'TOE HETEROMBFA. 
229 
bushes, &c., in the hot sunshine ; one of the others, 
Mycetochares bipustulata , a small, very agile insect, 
black, with a yellow shoulder-spot to the elytra, lives 
in rotten cherry-wood, &c., and, when found (for it is 
of rare occurrence), is generally seen in some numbers. 
The remaining species, JEryx atra, is nocturnal in its 
habits, frequenting old willow-trees, on which it is 
more often seen by lepidopterists, — who hunt by night 
for moths, — than by coleopterists. It is a dull black, 
oval, convex insect; rather large, but, like all its 
allies, of very delicate texture. Its larva, preparatory 
to undergoing metamorphosis, forms a cell composed 
of woody fibres glued together, and is the only one of 
this family known to take any such precaution. 
In Gteniopus and Omophlus, both found about mari- 
time plants, the males have the last abdominal segment 
considerably excavated ; and in Gistela the antennae 
are rather strongly serrated. 
The MEr.ANDRYinAi have the head not constricted 
behind and received into the thorax as far as the 
eyes, which are either entire or emarginate, the mau- 
dibles short, the antennae eleven-jointed (except in 
Conopalpus in which they are ten-jointed), the thorax 
not narrower at base than at apex and not narrower 
at base than elytra, and the anterior coxal cavities 
open behind ; the elytra cover the abdomen, which is 
composed of five free ventral segments ; the species 
are very variable in size and colour ; the family may 
be divided into two tribes, the Tetratomina and the 
Melandryma ; in the former of which the last four 
joints of the antennae form a very abrupt strong and 
distinct club, whereas in the latter the antennas are, 
as a rule, filiform or very gradually thickened, only 
