March 1, 1870.] 



HARDWICKE'S SCIEN C E-G OSSIP. 



4 ( J 



WINGLESS INSECTS. 



By the Rev. W. W. SPICER, M.A. 



E are so much in the 

 habit of associating 

 the power of flight 

 with the six legs, 

 two antennae, and 

 other attributes of 

 the insect world ; 

 the mind's eye, 

 when we picture 

 to ourselves, is so 

 filled with the bright butter- 

 flies, the droning beetles, the 

 shrill gnats, and the fierce 

 dragon-flies, which flit across 

 our path in the happy summer 

 tide, that the "apterous" sec- 

 tion seems to be too excep- 

 tional and too insignificaut to 

 be worth mention. Excep- 

 tional the wingless insects un- 

 doubtedly are, but it would 

 be wrong to say that they are insignificaut in point 

 of numbers. Of course, when speaking of the 

 absence of wings, I make no reference to the im- 

 perfect insect. Neither in the larval nor in the 

 pupal condition are the means of flying ever 

 found ; wings are the sole prerogative of the imago 

 or complete insect ; a hint, by the way, which may 

 be of service to beginners in their entomological 

 researches. 



In point of fact, every one of the eight orders 

 under which insects are usually ranged by modern 

 systematists, has its wingless representatives. 



Take the Coleoptera, the Beetles, which are 

 generally placed first in the list, as being the most 

 perfect in their organization and the richest in 

 species. The apterous members of this great order 

 are almost boundless, far too numerous to mention 

 individually. Thus we have the Oil Beetles (Jleloe), 

 the Bloody-noses (Timarcha), a vast number of 

 Weevils (Rhynchophori) ; as brachjderus, strophoso- 

 No. 63. 



miis, and a host of others. The family of Carabini, 

 the fiercest and swiftest of all beetles, supplies us 

 with numerous species in which the wings are 

 wanting. A remarkable member of this family must 

 be Trichmihjla uptera, to which Mr. Wallace intro- 

 duces us, as a cicindelid almost exclusively confined 

 to the Malay islands. "In shape it resembles a 

 very large ant, more than an inch long, and of a 

 purple-black colour. Like an ant also, it is wingless, 

 and is generally found ascending trees, passing 

 round the trunks in a spiral direction when 

 approached, to avoid capture ; so that it requires a 

 sudden rush and active fingers to secure a 

 specimen." These all exhibit their elytra in a 

 perfect condition, so that to the superficial observer 

 there is no indication of the absence of the organs 

 of flight ; for it is a noteworthy circumstance in 

 regard to beetles, that though the membraneous 

 underwings are so often wanting, the horny wing- 

 cases are invariably present. They are often very 

 minute, but they are there for all that. 

 Again, when of a fine summer's night we see, — 



" Among the crooked lanes on every hedge 

 The glowworm light her gem, and through the dark 

 A moving radiance twinkle," 



we must not forget, that one possible use for 

 which she throws out her phosphorescent lamp, is 

 to attract the attention of the winged male, whom 

 she cannot herself fly to meet, she being a mere 

 grub in appearance, without the trace of a wing, 

 and with very stumpy wing-cases. And here I 

 would observe, as another curious fact in insect 

 history, that, as regards the two sexes, where one is 

 winged and the other is wingless, the deprivation 

 almost invariably falls to the lot of the female. This 

 last remark is well illustrated in the next order, the 

 Strepsiptera, or Bee Lice : those singular parasites, 

 which take up their abode between the abdominal 

 plates in certain bees. The species are few and 

 obscure, but in every one, so far as is known, the 

 females are without the semblance of a wing. 



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