ENTOMOLOGICAL INTELLIGENCE, ETC. 
Ill 
Hypocephalus akjiatus (Plate 10).—In my observations on this 
curious genus (p. 39), it was mentioned that M. Guerin Meneville 
entertained the same opinion as Professor Burmeister relative to 
the natural relations of this anomalous genus. The views of 
M. Guerin have appeared in the “ Revue Zoologique, 1811, p. 217; 
and it is curious to perceive that many of the points of relation 
suggested by him are identical with those noticed in my article on 
the genus ; he likewise mentions a new genus, Anoploderma, from 
the Andes of Peru, (described by him in the Rev. Zool. 1810, 
p. 276,) which, like Hypocephalus, possesses short and robust tibise, 
dilated at the tips and armed with spines and teeth, and adds, 
that the person from whom M. Marc received his specimens of 
Hypocephalus found two individuals in the earth, or decayed wood, 
at the foot of a deep slit in the trunk of a tree. 
Since the publication of my memoir on this genus, I have received 
communications from several entomologists, some of whom, whose 
opinions will be read with respect, differ from the views above de¬ 
tailed : thus the Marquis Maximilian Spinola, in a letter dated Genoa, 
11th February, 1812, writes to me, “Your drawing of the Hypoce¬ 
phalus has changed my previous opinions on that anomalous genus. 
I cannot, however, resolve on admitting it among the Prioniti; and 
I have stated my doubts on the subject in my memoir on the 
Prioniti, which I have transmitted to the Academy of Sciences of 
Turin, and which will be inserted in the third volume of the Trans¬ 
actions of that Academy. I think all the inconvenience arises fiom 
laying it down as a necessity that every insect must be placed in a 
determinate family; but if the family has no circumscribed 
characters, we should call it a ‘ Familioides,’ and not a Family, 
and if it has any, the insect deprived of those characters, must stay 
at the door, but out of the family. If no other door is opened, it 
will remain without a family—and no matter for that, since Nature 
would have it so. Let it remain alone, until Nature, and not the 
love of system, grant it good company. Mr. Newman also, in a 
letter to me, has adopted the opinion which I expressed in my 
“ Modern Classification of Insects,” v. i., p. 150 ; observing, that 
“ Hypocephalus is not a Longicorn, unless the term extends to the 
Cucujites, to which it properly belongs; this group intervenes 
between Cerambyx and Lucanus.” [Thus taking up the relation of 
the Cucujidie pointed out by me in the Zoological Journal.] 
Spondylus appears to me to be related to Callidium, Prionus and 
Leptura.” [By which relations it would, as it appears to me, be 
