236 [September 



V. In the course of this last speculation, one of the proofs offered is, 

 that "• the earliest condition of an animal cannot be its hiohest condi- 

 tion — it does not pass from a more perfect to a less perfect state of 

 existence." {Ibid. p. 75.) This is generally, but not universally, true. 

 Westwood has well observed that " the case of the bark-lice (coccidae) 

 clearly proves that annulose animals may exist, which become more 

 and more imperfect as they approach the imago state;" and that in 

 that state the females " lose all trace of articulations in the body as 

 well as of articulated limbs, becoming in fact inert and fixed masses of 

 animal matter, motionless and apparently senseless." (Litr. II. p. 444.) 

 Again, in some genera of the Crustacean Cirripedes, (barnacles, &c.) 

 according to Darwin, '■ the larvae become developed either into herma- 

 phrodites having the ordinary structure, or into what are called com- 

 plemental males ; and in the latter the development has assuredly 

 been retrograde ; for the male is a mere sack, which lives for a short 

 time, and is destitute of mouth, stomach or other organ of importance, 

 excepting for reproduction." {Origin of Species, p. 384.) Prof. Dana, 

 who denies the theory of Agassiz that Lepidoptera are the highest 

 insects, which is based upon the above assertion, and who maintains 

 that Hymenoptera are the highest, quotes the adult, attached, plant- 

 like condition of the defunctionate Barnacle or Anatifa, and of other 

 species which become attached in the adult state, as another example 

 of general decline in grade in the adult state. (SiUiman's Journal, 

 May, 1864, p. 19, note.) So far as regards the question of the rela- 

 tive superiority of the different Orders of Insects, it cannot. I think, 

 be decided from the consideration of any one character, whether the 

 nature of the metamorphosis upon which Agassiz chiefly relies, or the 

 functions of the wings upon which Dana chiefly relies ; but upon a 

 general review of all the characters of each Order. The first method 

 is artificial, the second natural. 



VI. Prof. J. D. Dana has recently published an entirely new Classi- 

 fication of Insects, based, as he says, upon his new principle of Cepha- 

 lization. {Si/limans Journal, Vol. 37, pp. 10 — 33.) The following- 

 Table represents in a condensed form the leading features of this very 

 ingenious, but somewhat vague and indefinite arrangement. 



