CHRYSOPHYULUM, a genus of Plants belonging to the natural order Sapotacees. C. Cainito yields a West Indian fruit commonly called the Star-Apple. Like the rest of its kindred it abounds in a sweet harmless milky juice, that flows most copiously when the tree is beginning to mature its fruit, which grows on a moderately-sized spreading tree with very slender flexible branches. The leaves are dark-green on their upper surface, and are covered beneath with a remarkably satiny ferruginous pubescence. The flowers grow in small purplish bunches, and are succeeded by a round fleshy smooth fruit, resembling a large apple. In the inside it is divided into ten cella, each containing a black shining rhomboidal seed, and surrounded by a white, or sometimes purplish, gelatinous pulp, traversed with milky veins, and of a very sweet agreeable flavour. In an unripe state the taste is said to be astringent and unpleasant. When cut across, the seeds, which are regularly disposed round the axis of the fruit, present a stellate figure, from whence the name of Star-Apple is derived. There is a smaller species, which produces the fruit called the Damson-Plum. The tree is common in the hot-houses about upper surface is usually more or less slusgreened, and hence is not glossy ; the under surface is glossy, and generally sparingly covered with hairs of a pale colour.
With respect to their habits, it has been before remarked that the Cicindeltr are extremely voracious ; we may add, they are very active, and almost always take to the wing when approached, end hence are caught with difficulty ; their flight is however short- The situations which they inhabit are generally sandy pining or heaths., and sometimes the sea-shore or the shores of rivers, kc.; but some of the other genera of the Cicindelichr, from their form and colouring, appear to be more particularly adapted to these last-mentioned ei tunt ion*.
Six species of the genes Cicindela have been found in England, of which the moat common is Cicindela eampestris. This insect is found more or less abundantly throughout the country, and is very common in the neighbourhood of London; it is rather more than half an inch in length, and of a bright green colour ; the anterior and posterior margins of the thorax, the legs, and the l%sal joints of the antennte are of a rich copper-colour ; the under side of the body is glossy and of it blue-green colour ; the wing-cases are each adorned with six cream-coloured spots, one on the shoulder or outer angle, another at the apex, three on the outer margin at nearly equal distances apart, and one on the disc, a little lower down than the third marginal spot from the shoulder.
The larva of this insect is very well known, and may be found almost at eny time during the summer in sandy situations. It lives in cylindrical burrows, varying from six inches to a foot in depth, these burrows/ being excavated by itself. Like the perfect insect, it is very voracious, and in fine weather may be seen with its head on a level with the surface of the soil, lying in wait for any insect which may happen to crawl over its cell. Its form is remarkable : the head is very large and slightly concave ; the jaws are also largo and curved upwards ; the body is furnished with six legs, attached to the first three segments, and is humped near the middle of the back, at which part there are two tubercles, each of which is furnished with a horny hook ; these hooks and the body being naturally of a bent shape, enable the animal to sustain its position at the top of the cell, or to ascend and descend very quickly : the concave head and the recurred mandibles form a kind of natural basket, in which the soil is brought to the mouth of the cell during the progress of its ex cavation.
Four other Bri tish species of the genus Cicindcla — C. sylrat C. maritime, C. aprica, and C.
sylrieola, have white or cream coloured spots in the same situa tions as in C. campestri4, but they are joined together in pairs ; the two towards the base of the wing-case form a curved dash which surrounds the shoulder; the one on the dine of the elytron and that at the margin nearest it are also joined, and fern: a bent fascia, and the two at the apex form a bent dash, • which fob Iowa the outline of that part of the wing-case. This disposition of the markings, namely, a lunular spot at the shoulder, bent fascia in the middle, and another lunular spot at the apex of the olytron, Is that which is most commonly found in the species, and the must common colour is brownish-bronze ; such is the colour of C. maritime, C. riperia, and C sylricola ; the latter sometimes varies to a green hue.
In some exotic species of Ciciodela the elytra are adorned with numerous spots; eleven is tho greatest number we have found ; of these, however, three or four are often obliterated, and the others ere joined (two or three together) so as often to form three irregular slumped oblong /lashes or fasciae.
In some instances the markings run one into the other, so that there is more white than ground-colour ; and in one species, now before us, the wing-cases are entirely white. These markings vary but slightly in individuals of the same species.
The Cieindelidtr, in most arrangements of insects, form the first family of the Coleopt era.