This magnificent insect may be regarded as one of the rarest species figured in these Illustrations. Drury states, that the specimen here represented was brought from Africa by Mr. Ogilvie, surgeon of His Majesty's ship the Renown, being found floating, dead, in the river Gaboon, opposite Prince's Island, near the equinoctial line. Nearly seventy years have elapsed since the insect was first described, and yet the insect remains, as far as my knowledge extends, unique.[23] It would appear that the specimen either belonged to or passed into the hands of Dr. Hunter after the death of Mr. Drury, for Fabricius describes the species with a citation of the museum of Dr. Hunter alone; and Olivier's figure was taken from the specimen whilst it was in that gentleman's possession. After his decease it passed, with his collection, by bequest, into the possession of the University of Glasgow, where it now forms one of the most interesting objects in the Hunterian Museum. Joseph Hooker, Esq., son of Sir W. Hooker, the highly distinguished botanist of Glasgow, tells me that the individual in question was picked up by a sailor in the river above mentioned, and that it is stated in the MSS. of Dr. Hunter that it cost Mr. Drury £10. In the Catalogue of the Insects of Mr. Drury, which were sold by auction at the Natural History Sale Rooms in King Street, Covent Garden (now occupied by Mr. J. C. Stevens), on the 23rd of May, 1805, and two following days, the 95th lot is described as "Scarabæus Goliathus, _var._" Whence it would appear that the insect here figured was not in the possession of Mr. Drury at his decease, and that he only possessed the insect figured in the 3rd volume of these Illustrations, pl. 40, which evidently on the authority of Fabricius he had regarded as a variety only of the specimen here figured. The genus Goliathus is exceedingly interesting, not only on account of the gigantic size and singular form of the species of which it is composed, but also from the geographical range of the group. Mr. Kirby observes upon this subject, "Mr. W. S. MacLeay has remarked to me that Goliathus Lam. appears to belt the globe, but not under one form. The types of the genus are the vast African Goliaths (G. giganteus, &c.), which, as well as G. Polyphemus, and another brought from Java by Dr. Horsfield, have, like Cetonia, the scapulars interposed between the posterior angles of the prothorax and the shoulders of the elytra, while the South American species (G. micans,[24] &c.) have not this projection of the scapulars; in this resembling Trichius; Mr. MacLeay further observes, that the {63}female of the Javanese Goliathus is exactly a Cetonia, while that of the Brazilian is a Trichius."--_Introd. to Entomology_, vol. 4. p. 494.