BUPRESTIS. Saw-horned wood beetles. A genera of beetles with hard and metallic color ing, and hard and inflexible bodies. They are principally a tropical farnily. In the torrid zone they attain great size and dazzling coloring. Dr. LeBaron says of the family that the larvie present two very distinct forms. The usual form is at once distinguished from all other Coleopter ous larvx by the enormous development of the first segment of the body, into which the head is partly retractile. The other segments are narrow and slightly flattened. This form of the larym has caused them to be compared with tadpoles, and the French authors describe them as re sembling a pestle. They are wholly destitute of legs. These laryze usually live under the bark of trees in a state of incipient decay, but some of them penetrate into the solid wood. Some of the smaller species inhabit the stems of small trees or shrubs, causing them to enlarge so as to resemble galls. An exaxn,ple of the former is the flat-headed ,borer of the apple and soft maple trees (see Flat-Headed Borer); and an example of the latter is the raspberry cane-borer, or larv of the Agrilus ruficollis. The other form of Bupres tide larvw is that of the Brachyides or short bodied Buprestidm. In these the first segment is not enlarged, the body is slender and tapering, and each of the three first segments is furnished with a pair of very small feet, placed wide apart. These species are all very small, and such of them as are known are leaf-miners. In an economical point of view, the Buprestidir occupy a peculiar position, intermediate between the genuine wood-borers (Ceramloyeithe and Scoly tidm), which bore into the solid wood of trees, and those kinds of wood-beetles which (like the Elateridw and raany of the Heteromerous beetles) inhabit wood and hark in an advanced state of decay. In accordance with this position, they are usually the first insects to attack trees which have been injured by sun-scald, or which have otherwise had their vitality weakened. The largest North American species is the Chalco phora Virginiensis of Drury, nearly or quite an inch in length, of a dark coppery or blackish color, and a very uneven surface, caused by elevated lines and depressed square-shaped spots. The larvw inhabit the trunks of different kinds of pine trees, and the perfect insects are to be found, therefore, only in pine growing regions. The Dicerca divaricata, Say, is three-quarters of an inch or more in length, copper colored, with a granulated surface. It is distinguished at once by its tapering elytra, separated at the tips. Its larvee bore into the trunks of cherry and peach trees. We have another smaller and more ob scure species, the D. lurida, Fab., the larvm of
which inhabit the hickory. The Otrysobothris femorata, an obscure bronze-black species, rather less than half an inch in length, is the parent of the well known fiat-headed borer, so injurious to apple trees, and also to the soft maple. The genus Acmceodera, Esch., contains a number of small species of a bronzed-brown color, some times with purple and green reflections, and the elytra prettily spotted with yellow. The colors are somewhat obscured hy the surface being clothed with stiff, erect hairs. The A. tubulus, Fab., and the A. pulchella, Herbst, are the most common species. They are often found in abundance on the flowers of the Coreopsis. The genus Agritus, Solier, is easily recognized by the elongate, slender, and cylindrical form of the species The raspberry borer, Agrilus ruficollis, Fab., may he taken as the American type of this genus. It is three-tenths of an inch long, black, with a coppery-red thorax. Buprestis, including AnchylocItira, Esch., is composed of species mostly between a half and three-quarters of an inch in length, of a brassy-green or a brassy black color, and often ornamented with yellow spots on the elytra; some also have yellow spots on the sides of the venter. The species of Mel an,ophila, Esch'., are from three to five-tenths of an inch in length, black, sometimes with obscure bronze or purple tints. Some species haye four yellow dots on each elytron. The species of Anthazia, Esch., are less than three-tenths of an inch long, brassy-black, and without spots. The head and thorax are sculptured with shallow punctures, with the intervening lines forming a fine net-work. We have two common species of Brachys, Sol., the Ovata, Weber, and the 2Erosa, Melsh. Verminous? Fah.), and several rarer species, some of which may be only varieties or races of the first. The B. ovata is two-tenths of an inch or more in length, of a bronze color, variegated with spots and imperfect transverse waving bands of whitish and copper colored pubescence. The B. terminans is smaller and less distinetly variegated, but most readily dis tinguished by the pale tips of the elytra. Metonius, Say, (Pachyscelus, Solier), has two species about an eighth of an inch in length ; the lavigatus, Say, wholly blaek ; and the purpurca, Say,black, with dark-blue elytra. The following are the ,genera of Buprestida : Acmceodera, species; Agrilus, forty species; Anthaxia, four teen species; Brachys, eighteen species; Buprestis, twenty-three species; Chaleophora, seven species; -Chrysobothris, forty-three speeies ; Dicerca. twenty four species; .kelanophila ten species; and Meton ius, two species.