ZOOLOGY. 445 



In whatever way the wings are confined, provided their im- 

 mobility be incomplete, the buzzing absolutely ceases ; con- 

 trary to Hunter's statement. M. Perez's observations can be 

 readily repeated, if nice methods of procedure are followed, 

 by observers in this country, and this vexed question be set 

 at rest. 



One of the walking-stick insects, or JPhasmidoe, has been 

 discovered by Mr. Wood-Mason to be a sound-producing in- 

 sect. In Pterinoxylus he found that a stridulating noise Avas 

 produced by a rasp on the hind wing, in connection with a 

 resonant swelling on the wing-cover, and this appeared in the 

 females. This apparatus is much like that of locusts ((Edi- 

 2)oda ). 



While the organs of sense are in vertebrate animals inva- 

 riably attached to the head, in the lower animals ears and 

 antennae-like organs, and perhaps smelling organs, may be 

 found in the abdomen, or elsewhere. That all those insects 

 which produce sound must have the faculty of hearing it, 

 seems a truism ; still it is difficult to discover the seat of the 

 organs of hearing. In locusts or grasshoppers the organs of 

 hearino- are situated at the base of the abdomen in two lar^e 

 sacs situated next to the sticrmata in the basal segment. Mr. 



d? CD 



A. II. Swinton has now found that somewhat similar organs 

 of hearino; likewise exist at the base of the abdomen of some 



CD 



moths, as certain JVocticidce, or owlet moths. If, says Mr. 

 Swinton, after having killed an individual of a large JVbctna, 

 and denuded the abdomen of scales and hair, we examine its 

 junction with the thorax, we observe a constriction of the 

 segments that has occurred in the metamorphosis, whereby 

 the first and second abdominal segments of the caterpillar 

 are represented by dorsal arcs indicating a pedicel. In the 

 Noctxdna the oroan of hearino; is found between these con- 



CD CD 



tracted segments and the metathorax. The external ear is 



CD 



recognized in a rather large cavity that here penetrates the 

 abdomen on each side, and is oval in section, with a posterior 

 excavation, or couch. There is, besides, a tube, which is the 

 counterpart of the Eustachian tube. In its general structure 

 the moth's ear is like that of the grasshopper. Mr. Swinton 

 has observed similar ears in moths of the silk-worm and geo- 

 metrid families, and they may be traced in certain Diptera, 

 as the crane-flv. 



