CLASSIFICATION. 



Although I have devoted much time to the study of the Orthoptera for a 

 number of years past, yet my opportunities for examining exotic species and 

 types of foreign genera have been too limited to enable me to form an arrange- 

 ment of the various divisions and subdivisions wholly satisfactory to myself. 

 Yet in a work of this kind, as some system must necessarily be adopted, it is 

 proper that I should indicate that which I prefer, as it must, to a greater or 

 less degree, determine the characters selected to distinguish the different 

 groups, and the comparative value I attach to them. 



It is comparatively easy to arrange the different families and groups of 

 Orthoptera in a continuous series, if we select some j^rominent character, and 

 confine ourselves to its form or development ; but wlien we attempt to classify 

 according to the development of the entire insect in its various stages — that 

 is, according to a natural system — we experience great difficulty, and conse- 

 quently find entomologists arriving at very different conclusions. If we select 

 alternately the external anatomy, the nervous system, digestive apparatus, 

 genital organs, &c., we shall find that each will lead to a result different from 

 the others. For example, if we take the nervous system as our guide, the 

 result wiU be to place the Acrididce at the head of the order, and, according 

 to L^on Dufour, the Orthoptera at the head of the class. On the other hand, 

 if we examine the digestive apparatus, we find the salivary glands and ali- 

 mentary canal of the same family the least developed of any in the order, 

 except possibly the ForficulidcB. Lacaze-Duthiers, who has studied with 

 much care the genital organs of the various orders, states that, if we take the 

 development of the ovipositor as a guide, the divisions of this order will 

 arrange themselves as follows : Locustidce, GryllidcB, Mantida, Phasmidce, 

 Blattidce, Acrididce, FoificulidcB ; thus placing all the families of the non-salta- 

 torial genuine Orthoptera between the two sections of Ihe Saltatoria. If we 

 take the embryological development as a guide, I am incHned to think, judg- 

 ■ ing from the shape of the egg in the different families and the embryo of the 

 Acridii. that the Locmtidce would stand near the head, while the Acrididce 

 would drop to the toot ; but the embryology has not been sufficiently studied 



