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Show 1886.] REV. H. S. GORHAM ON NEW COLEOPTERA. 155 Head with a few scattered but distinct punctures; club of the antennae rather lax and dull. Thorax shining, not punctured, but with the surface uneven; anterior margin deeply excavated for the head, and with the anterior angles turned inwards; the sides much rounded in front; the disk with a short central elongate impression, and a round one on each side; the sides much puckered. Elytra smooth and waxy, impunctate; all the disk of a pitchy-purple tint, which in life was, as Mr. Lewis informs me, of a most beautiful violaceous colour. They have a double, not much elevated, tumidity each side of the scutellum. The humeral callus is much inflated, to the extent of about a quarter of the length of the elytra; this tumidity is scarcely carinate and not spinose; the reflexed"margin of the elytra is complete, running as a fine line beneath the callus up to the basal angle; the epipleural fold is black and shining. The anterior tibiae are very faintly incurved, and compressed into a shallow spoon-shaped hollow at their apices, and the middle pair are more strongly incurved at their tips, the hind pair slightly so ; all the tibiae have the apices pubescent inwardly; the hair at the tips is golden. Of this very singular and beautiful Spathomeles a pair were beaten off a dead branch in the jungle by Mr. Lewis at Dickoya, at 5000 feet elevation. 2. SPATHOMELES ORNATUS. S. decorato valde affinis, oblongus, niger, nitidus; elytris sub-violaceis, maculis tribus elevatis, una basilari rotundata, una ante medium transversa in medio constricta, una subapicali sub-lunulata, luteis. Long. 13-15 millim. <$ 2 • Mas. Elytris spina dorsali brevi obtusa, femoribus anticis, tibiis mediis ante apicem dentatis, tibiis posticis ante medium angu-lariter late dentatis. Hab. Assam. Very closely allied to S. decoratus, Gerst., and perhaps not more than a geographical form ; the evident toothing of the hind tibiae is, however, very important, and the union of the two middle yellow spots, which in 8. decoratus are, so far as I have observed, always separate, seems to point to a permanent specific difference. The spots are all rather more developed than in S. decoratus ; the basal one is round. One male and two female specimens. STICTOMELA, gen. nov. Corpus ovatum. Elytris convexis, maris haud spinulosis. Pro-thorax antice ampliato-rotundus. Prosternum apice truncatum, coxas anticas superans. Mandibular apice bidentatce. Palpi maxillares articulo ultimo conoideo apice minute truncato. A genus very nearly approaching Spathomeles; the points in which it principally differs are, that in the males the elytra are not armed with a spine, and the prothorax is differently shaped, resembling more that of the Amphisterni of the second section without 8 11* |
