PREFACE. 
HE Nitidulidae are generally of scavenging habits, but some live 
in flowers, in stored products, and in bees’ nests, while others are 
predaceous on Scolytids and Coccids, There are in all 228 species 
up to the present recorded from India. 
The family has been split up into six sub-families 01 the characters 
given below :— 
The table is adapted from Grouvelle’s paper in Annales de la Société 
Entomologique de France, Vol. LX XVII, 1908, 325 and 326; and from 
Reitter’s Fauna Germamea, Vol. III, 11. 
( Maxilla with two lobes ; Pye pro- 
1 cess absent. , Cateritine. 
Maxilla with one lobe ; rostamal Panes 
| almost always present. ; tee 
> § At least 2 segments of abdomen exposed Carpophiline. 
“ ( At most pygidium exposed : os 
Tarsi 4-jointed . ; : . Cybocephaline. 
Tarsi 5-jointed . : . 4 
4 Labrum clearly distinct from epistome. 5 
Labrum soldered with epistome . . Cryptarchine, 
(Middle and posterior tibiee with single 
| outer margin, dorsally without carina ; 
all tibie wide, their outer angles 
rounded off, or obliquely truncate ; 
5 the fore tibiee notched or toothed . »Meligethines 
Middle and posterior tibize with double 
outer margin, the upper one directed 
dorsally ; all tibiz truncate at end or 
with outer angle drawn intoa tooth . Nitidulina. 
HK 
To avoid repetition the following abbreviations are used in qed 
references to literature :— 
AAS aN . Annulosa Javanica, London, 1825. 
Ae M. Gise. . Annali del Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di 
Genova, Genoa. 
A. M. N. H. . Annales and Magazine of Natural History, London. 
ALN. : . Archiv fiir Naturgeschichte, Berlin. 
