COLEOPTERA . 
i47 
that to most people they are only known by the sounds they produce, or the 
holes with which the larvae riddle furniture and the woodwork of houses. The 
holes with which old books are sometimes seen to be perforated are also made 
by the larvae of a species of Anobium, which for this reason are known as book¬ 
worms. 
SECTION HETEROMERA. 
CHURCHYARD BEETLE AND LARVA (nat. size) 
The Heteromera are those beetles in which the tarsi of the fore and middle- 
legs are five-jointed, those of the hind-legs being four-jointed. The Tenebrionidoe 
exceed in number of species the rest of the Heteromera together. The antennae 
are inserted under a projecting angle or ridge on each side of the head, and 
composed of eleven or, 
exceptionally, ten joints, 
of which the third is 
generally the longest; the 
coxae of the front-legs are 
usually rounded, with their 
sockets separated by a 
fairly broad prosternal 
process, and completely 
closed in behind; and the 
claws of all the tarsi are 
simple. Many of the 
obscurely coloured species 
are without wings, and 
frequently have the elytra 
fused together. The 
churchyard beetles (Maps) and the meal-worm ( Tenebrio ) are probably the best 
known members of the family. B. mucronata is the commonest species in England; 
it differs from B. mortisaga, which also occurs, though rarely, in this country, in 
having shorter points to the elytra. Of the genus Tenebrio two species occur in 
Britain, one of which (T. molitor ) is almost cosmopolitan in its range, having been 
carried in flour to nearly every part of the world. The larvae, 
known as meal - worms, are long and narrow, of a light 
yellowish red colour, with the integument hard, and the last 
segment conical in shape and ending into two slightly diverging 
processes, armed each with a small black spine. 
The Rhipidophoridce are a small but interesting family 
of beetles in which the wings are always more or less exposed, 
and not folded transversely as in most other groups, while the 
elytra are either very short (as in the genera Rhipidopltorus 
and Rhipidius), or else triangular in form, meeting only at the 
base and diverging; from one another behind. 
The Meloidce are chiefly distinguished from the other Heteromera by having 
the head abruptly constricted behind in the form of a short neck, the coxae of the 
anterior and middle legs long and prominent, and placed close to one another in 
THE COMMON MEAL-WORM 
AND ITS LARVA 
(enlarged). 
