The Rev. Wm. Kırzy on a new Order of Insects. 97 
can here speak with more confidence. These pupz exhibit no 
trace either of wings, antenne, palpi, or legs*, under their en- 
velope, so that they appear to come nearest to the coarctate 
metamorphosis, but with this difference, that the head-case is 
distinct from that which covers the rest of the body. In this 
kind of metamorphosis also the skin of the larva usually hardens 
and forms a cocoon, in which the parts of the future i imago are 
developed ; but whether, in the order of insects we are consider- 
ing, the pupa rejects or retains the skin of the larva, is not clear. 
From Rossi's observations it should seem that the insect is en- 
veloped by a double integument}, the exterior of which may be 
analogous to the cocoon formed by the skin of the larva, and the 
interior to the membrane in which even a coarctate pupil is 
inclosed : that part of the body, however, which remains inserted 
in the body of the Melitta or Vespa i is soft and fleshy, while the 
head and neck, being exposed to the air, become hard and cor- 
neous. One peculiarity observable in the pupa of : Peck's 
species would seem to imply that it does reject tlie skin of the 
larva, at least as far as the head is concerned, for the eye-covers 
(a part, to the best of my recollection, peculiar to this insect,) 
are set with pellucid hexagons}; which looks as if they were in- 
tended by the all-wise Author of nature to transmit some light to 
the insect when in the pupa state : it is evident by an inspection 
of Professor Peck's figures 3 and 4, that the larva has nothing of 
this kind ; therefore the skin, at least of the head, must be cast. 
* Tas. IX. fig. 17. This figure was taken from a specimen, the only one I could 
procure, that had been long extracted from the body of a Melitta. 
t He pupe, si acüs ope e loco penitus extrahantur, abruptoque tegumento m de- 
inde tunicá seu veste allá propriá exuantur. Rossi, | 
— t Tas. VIII. fig. 7. 
CS LT x 
