THE ORGANS OF NUTRITION. 127 



In the Diptera, lastly, (P). XVIII. f. 2 and 3, c, c,) the sucking 

 stomach is still more distinctly divided from the oesophagus, and is a 

 single mouthed bag, having one or several ends, and furnished with a 

 solitary evacuating duct. When empty it is small and wrinkled, but 

 when distended it is of large dimensions. In its natural situation it 

 lies contiguous to and over the stomach, at the very commencement of 

 the abdomen, whence its delicate evacuating duct, rising anteriorly, 

 accompanies the stomach as far as the oesophagus, of the size of which 

 it generally is, and opens into it more or less closely to the cardia *. 

 According to Ramdohr this organ is the food bag (speisesack), as it 

 serves for the reception of food. Meckel calls it, from the same cause, 

 the honey vessel (honigbehdlter), and he found in it a peculiar, coloured 

 liquid. But Treviranus' representation is much too illustrative, and 

 his investigations in insects opened alive much too conclusive to admit 

 of the least doubt being entertained of the function of this organ. 



The Hemiptera, which likewise live upon imbibed juices, have no 

 sucking stomach, nor any analogous apparatus ; this is the case also 

 in the Pupipara and the flea, although they must necessarily be classed 

 among the Diptera f. 



THE PROVENTRICULUS. 



104. 



The PROVENTRICULUS (PI. XVII. f. 8 & p. 21, f. 810) is the 

 third division of the intestinal canal, if we may consider the crop or 

 sucking stomach as nothing but a distension of the oesophagus. It is a 

 small narrow and tubular cavity, much folded within, and furnished 

 with teeth, spines, or projecting horny ridges. It lies directly in front 

 of the mouth of the stomach, and as which it may properly be con- 

 sidered. It is found in all mandibulate insects which feed upon hard 

 substances, or require the comminution of their food previous to 

 digestion; consequently in all the carnivorous tribes (Carabodea, 

 Hydrocantharid.es, Brachyptera), the wood-beetles (Cerambycina, 

 but here somewhat altered), many Rhinchophora , the Orthoptera, 

 (with the exception of the Phasmce and the Grylli, whose whole crop 

 is furnished with spines which serve to triturate the food), and the 

 Neuroptera. Exteriorly it has always a round somewhat ovate appear- 



* See Ramdohr, PI. XVIII. XXL, and Trevir.Pl. XVII. 

 t See Ramdohr, PI. XXI. f. 6., and PI. XXIII. f. 2. 



