340 



EXTRACTS FROM FOREIGN JOURNALS. 



ZOOLOGY. 



On a new Group of Insects of the Family Mantidce. — M. Dume- 

 ril has communicated some observations on a new group of insects of the fa- 

 mily of Mantidce, The forms of the species belonging to this family are most 

 singular ; some resembling walking sticks, others appearing like green leaves 

 fastened together, and walking thus united. Their head, abdomen, legs, &c., 

 present the greatest varieties of shape, from which they have received names 

 expressive of their remarkable contour, as Spectres^ Phasmes, Phyllis, Mantes 

 or Diables, Prcgadious. It is a new group of this family, named, by M. Du- 

 mdril, Anomides, ( Anomidoe ), that M. Lefebvre has described. He has col- 

 lected several species in Egypt. In a monagraj)h on the subject, he gives 

 an account of the organization of the two new genera, which he names, the 

 one, Eremiophilus, because he has only met with it in deserts; the other, 

 Heteronuf arsis, on account of the tarsi, and especially the nails, being diffe- 

 rent in the posterior and anterior legs — Another paper, by the same author, 

 will describe the larva and perfect insect of a new species of Clerus, which he 

 has found in a medullary substance with which the bottom of an insect-tin 

 was covered, and which proceeded from the root of jEschynomene paludosa. 



On the Development of the £oos of Planorbis — M. Jacquemin 

 has communicated to the Academie des Sciences of Paris new details relative 

 to the development of the eggs of Planorbis. He indicates, each day, the 

 progress of this development, observes on the tenth day the first trace of the 

 formation of the testicle, on the eleventh the pulsations of the heart, and on 

 the thirteenth the action of deglutition. On the fourteenth day the hatch- 

 ing takes place ; but pulmonary respiration only commences six or eight 

 days afterwards. — Echo du Monde Savant. 



BOTANY. 



On two new species of Spitzelia. — We have already more than once 

 had occasion to speak of the works of M. Schultz, Siir les Chicotacees, (Cicho- 

 racese). In the first article we described the genus Spitzelia, Delile ; and in 

 the second we spoke of another species of the same genus, Crepis radicata, 

 Sieber. Through the kindness of M. Ad. de Jussieu, the author has been 

 enabled to add to this genus two other plants, Picris lyrata, Delile, and Leon- 

 todon coronopifolium, Desf. M. Schultz arranges the species of his new genus 

 in two groups, and distinguishes them as follows : — 



I. Scariositas acheniorum radii basin fere usque in pilos divisa. 



1. S. eegypliaca Acheniis disci breve rostratis. 



2. S. Siebet-i. — Acheniis disci truncatis. 



II. Scariositas acheniorum radii cupuliformis, ad medium tantum in pilos 

 divisa. 



3. S. lyrata. — Caulc foliato subramoso (Picris lyrata, Del.) 



