LOEW AS A DIPTEROLOGIST 
117 
was based on the number of joints, not of the antennae only but 
also of the palpi. The name Nemocera was introduced by Latreille 
for the same concept eight years later, in 1817. (For details, 
compare my paper: “On the characters,” etc., in Berl. Ent. Zeit ., 
1892, p. 413-422; 130, 1892.) 
As in my translation of the above quoted passage I have rendered the sense 
of Loew as clearly as possible without attempting to be literal, I reproduce here 
the German original: “ Alle clrei Gattungen haben ihre natiirliche Stellung bei 
den Xylophagiden, auf welche auch der Ban der Mundtheile, soweit er bekannt 
ist, hinweist. Nur der Umstand, dass dadurch die Granzlinie zwischen den beiden 
Hauptabtheilungen der Diptern etwas verwischt wird, hat mich bestimmt in meiner 
Schrift iiber den Bernstein die Gattungen Chrysothemis und Electra den Xemoceren 
beiznrechnen, und sie trotz dem zusammengesetzten Fliigelgeader als letzte Gat¬ 
tungen zu den Bibioniden zu bringen ; ich glaubte dort mir dies denen zu Gunsten 
erlauben zu konnen, welche sich nicht speciell mit dem Studium der Diptern 
besch'aftigen, da in der That der TJebergang von den Nemoceren zu den Brachy- 
ceren durch die Bibioniden einerseits und (lurch die Xylophagiden andererseits 
vermittelt wird, und da ich in jener Schrift erstere mit den Bibioniden schloss und 
letztere mit den Xylophagiden begann. Dass die drei Gattungen Rachicerus, 
Chrysothemis und Electra ihren natiirliehen Platz aber durchaus nur bei den 
Xylophagiden haben, ist mir nie zweifelhaft gewesen.” 
I have mentioned (p. 109) Loew’s attempt in 1844 to connect 
the newly discovered genus Liponeura with Macropeza , Diamesa , 
and other genera, which have nothing to do with it. Several years 
later Loew became more intimately acquainted with the Blepharo- 
ceridae , and published two successive monographs of them (1869 
and 1877). In these papers we find him hesitating in the choice 
of a character for a primary subdivision. In the first paper, pub¬ 
lished in Ilaliday’s Italian translation of it, he adopted as such the 
length of the proboscis; in the second, he made use for the same 
purpose of the spurs at the end of the hind tibiae. In my succes¬ 
sive papers (60, 1878 ; 124, 1891; 144, 1895) on the same subject, 
beginning with the first, which appeared a year after Loew’s last 
paper, I have shown that, for a primary divisional character of the 
family, the presence or absence of the incomplete vein near the 
posterior margin, as far as our present knowledge goes, is more 
satisfactory than the characters proposed by Loew. A singular 
proof of Loew’s too great reliance on the venation, as an index of 
relationship, I find in a letter to me (October 1, 1858), written 
