The Longicorn beetles comprise numerous species that are highly injurious both to growing trees and to timber, and some excellent papers have been published dealing either with important species and the methods of preventing their damage (Brooks, 1920) or giving a survey of a particular fauna (Craighead, 1923). Nevertheless, there are some rather important features of the life-history of these beetles that seem to have attracted onlyscant attention, and which have hitherto not been subjected to a systematic analysis. The purpose of this paper is to call attention to these neglected features and to give a short survey of the meagre and scattered information that we have about them, in order tostimulate further study, which seems warranted from both a theoretical and a practical point of view.

I am indebted to the Imperial Bureau of Entomology and to Mr. F. Laing, of the British Museum, for submitting to me for classification two small lots of Thysanoptera collected by Messrs. G. Samuel and J. G. Bald, of the Waite Agricultural Research Institute, Glen Osmond, South Australia.

The genus Niponius has hitherto been studied only from the standpoint of the adult characters, the larva having been unknown. These characters were considered by Fowler (Fauna of British India, Coleoptera, General Introduction 1912, p. 93) probably to be worthy of family rank; to quote Fowler “The very curious genus Niponius is closely related to the Histeridae, to which family it was assigned by its discoverer, Mr. G. Lewis, but it also bears affinities to other families, and is in several ways abnormal; we have therefore regarded it, with some hesitation, as provisionally separate.” The structure of the male genital tube was studied by Sharp & Muir (Trans. Ent. Soc. Lond., 1912, p. 512) and they remark (l.c. p. 513) “The four families Histeridae, Synteliidae, Sphaeritidae and Niponiidae are so closely related by the aedeagus, that they might form one family, in which the Histeridae would include the higher developments.”

The material upon which the following descriptions are based, was received through the Imperial Bureau of Entomology, and I am indebted to the Director of that institution for the privilege of studying it.

In the Transactions of the Entomological Society of London, 1929, in the introduction to my revision of the Indo-Australian and Ethiopian species of Microgaster, I stated my intention of writing subsequently for the related genus Microplitis a revision of the species from the same area. This I have done in the present paper, the slight alteration of title being necessary as no species of Microplitis have yet been described from the Ethiopian region.

Stibaropus tabulatus, Schiödte, a Pentatomid bug of the subfamily Cydninae, is remarkable in having the unusual habit of living underground and attacking the roots of tobacco, and to the best of the writer's knowledge this is the first record of this species as an insect of economic importance; though Lefroy has mentioned the allied S. molginus, Schiödte, in his “Indian Insect Life” (p. 674) as having been observed at the roots of a palm in South India at a considerable depth below the surface. As the insect under report was something of a novelty and was a pest of such a valuable crop like tobacco, the writer made special efforts to study its life-history and habits, and it is the aim of this paper to place on record the results of his observations and studies, though he regrets that they are somewhat fragmentary in character.

♀. Head shining green; face and front with purplish shine. Thorax orange-yellow, with a small black spot on each side of the pronotum; mesopleurae and propodeon slightly brownish. Abdomen aeneous-black, with dark green shine near the end; first segment (except two brown spots at the sides) and second segment (except hind border) whitish. Valvae of ovipositor white. Antennae brown, with scape and pedicel yellow. Wings dark brown, with the base and a bent stripe in the middle hyaline. Legs brownish yellow, with the trochanters and tip of tibiae and tarsi clearer yellow; base of hind coxae and a stripe on the inner side of middle and hind femora dark brown.

The following notes are based on material submitted to me for study by the Imperial Bureau of Entomology. The drawings were made by Mr. D. E. Kimmins.

It is now more than twenty-five years since his useful “Key to Families of Coleopterous Larvae” was published by Macgillivray. Since that time descriptions of many larvae and representatives of a considerable number of families, then unknown, have been made available, and research on the taxonomy of families and super-families has added very considerably to our knowledge of the early stages of beetles. Without being invidious, it may not be out of place to mention the work of Saalas on spruce-beetles, of Verhoeff on several families and especially the Clavicorn group, of d'Orchymont on the Hydrophilidae, of de Peyerimhoff on the larvae of several obscure families, and, not least of these, that of Böving made known in a number of papers on the species, families and super-families of this order of insects. These and many others, too numerous to mention here, but whose names will in most cases be found in the bibliography, have made notable additions to our knowledge since the publication of Macgillivray's work.

In his classification of the Pyralid subfamily Galleriinae (Novitates Zoologicae, xxiv, 1917), Sir George Hampson, in reviewing the genus Tirathaba, Walker, has created some confusion in dealing with the species Tirathaba rufivena, Walker.

In 1925 (Bull. Ent. Res., xv, p. 289) I described a species of Metadrepana (M. andersoni, Tams) the larvae of which were found defoliating coffee in Kenya Colony in 1922. Figures were given of the male genitalia of three species. The species described below has for some years been known by the name Metadrepana glauca, Hampson, but a year or two ago I discovered, on examining some specimens sent to the Imperial Bureau of Entomology by Mr. H. Hargreaves, that these were not M. glauca, but a new species. Mr. G. L. R. Hancock has recently sent a good series of this new species, which is a very variable one, and I am now able to describe it.

Palpus upcurved, the 2nd segment broadly and smoothly scaled in front, its distal extremity reaching the level of the vertex of the head, the 3rd segment long and acuminate (blunter in the male than in the female). Frons rounded, smoothly scaled. Tibiae with outer spurs half as long as inner. Fore wing with veins R3+R4 anastomosed for three-fourths of their length, R2 closely approximated to them, R5 almost straight and diverging from them; veins M2, M3, and Cu1 arising close together from lower angle of cell, vein Cu2 from cell at about five-sixths. Hind wing with vein Sc anastomosing with vein Rs to near apex; veins M2, M3, Cu1, and Cu2 disposed as in fore wing.

1. The chief pests of cocoa and chocolate are the Pyralid moths, Ephestia elutella (cocoa moth), E. kühniella (Mediterranean flour moth), E. cautella (fig moth), and Plodia interpunctella (Indian meal moth).

2. Beans are infested before arrival at the factory, this infestation commencing on the plantation and increasing during the various stages of transit to the factory. The docks, in particular, may be the most important source of infestation owing to the fact that there fresh consignments may be brought into direct contact with much older consignments already heavily infested.

3. The steps recommended for factory use are:—

(a) General cleanliness in all parts of the factory, avoidance of dead spaces which offer opportunities for breeding and pupation, removal of all waste material, constant sweeping, frequent whitewashing and distempering, etc.

(b) Heat treatment of beans on arrival at the factory and subsequent storage where they will not be liable to re-infestation. The heat treatment to consist of subjection to a temperature of 60° C.–65° C. for a time dependent on quantity of beans.

(c) The use of traps in the factory in order to keep down the numbers of stray moths. Such traps may consist of vinegar and syrup.

(d) The protection of all finished goods by means of fine-mesh materials so far as possible.

4. No insect life survives either roasting or any stage of manufacture in which the chocolate is in a molten condition.

5. Although parasites exist which prey on the larvae of these moths, it is not considered that extermination by means of them would be practicable.

6. Fumigation of warehouses, especially at the docks, is under consideration by the Empire Marketing Board, and any recommendation they may make will probably be applicable to factories. At the present stage, however, it is premature to make suggestions.