78 TlMEHRI. 
or the tree. The specimen which my friend, the 
native gave me, asserting that it was the true 
Sawyer Beetle, is not a large beetle, and closely 
resembles the Lamia subocellata, though apparently 
a different species. There is a very general opinion 
that there is a Sawyer Beetle, but I scarcely think 
that people are agreed as to which beetle it is, or what 
is the nature of its operations. It is quite possible that 
there are more than one.* 
The Prionus corticinus or Bark Sawyer is about an 
inch long, is somewhat depressed, and has elongated 
wing-cases nearly the same breadth throughout its 
length. Its prevailing colour is brown, but in some parts 
it appears to be yellow. It is more commonly met with 
here than the previous beetle. 
The Cerambycida? (from the Greek keratnbux, a kind 
of horned beetle) or Horned Beetles resemble the 
Prionidae in the general appearance of their bodies, but, 
though their antennae are long, their mandibles are about 
the normal size and nearly alike in both sexes, while 
* After making all possible allowance for the fact that there may be 
more than one beetle which cuts off the twigs of plants, there scarcely 
seems reason to doubt that the reputed sawyer beetle is the " Prionus 
cervicornis," since it is the most likely beetle here which, from the 
structure and size of its mouth parts, can be considered able to cut 
through the comparatively large branches which are said to be cut 
through by the beetle and which give every indication of being cut 
through by such an agency. I have been assured by a bushman who 
has seen the beetle at work, but at such a height that it has always 
been impossible to procure the specimen, that instead of whirling its 
body round and round by means of its wings, the sawyer beetle after 
seizing the branch between its long and toothed powerful mandibles, 
simply walks round and round the branch. Possibly the inse6t steadies 
itself by means of its unfolded wings while thus engaged. — Ed. 
