ARE THE ORTHOPTERA AND NEUROPTERA ACTUAL 

 ORDERS OR CONGLOMERATIONS? 



By Stephen Gottheil Rich, M.A., B.Sc. 



{Read July lo, 19 18.) 



In the museums of this country, with the single exception of 

 the Natal Museum, the orders of insects are separated according 

 to the Linnean scheme, or the slight modification of it devised by 

 Sharp, 1895. The orders Orthoptera and Nciiroptera accordingly 

 appear in their original extent. The former includes Forficulidac, 

 Gryllidae, Locustidae, Acrididac, Manfidae, Blattidae, Phas- 

 midae, and one or two minor families ; the latter includes Epheme- 

 ridae, Termitidae, PcrUdac, Odonata, Panorpidae, and the group 

 of families typified by the Myrmeleonidac. 



I propose briefly to consider this assemblage as a whole, by 

 the criteria of recent work in the groups, and to show whether the 

 accepted grouping is in accordance with facts. In so doing, I 

 base my work mainly upon the recent articles of G. C. Cramptou 

 in various American journals of entomology. Crampton sums 

 up his comparative studies in anatomy in a paper, " The Lines of 

 Descent of the Lower Pterygotan Insects."* His other papers 

 are studies of particular parts through a number of families : 

 antennae, thoracic sclerites, abdominal appendages, etc. 



At the start I may well admit a prejudice against the Linnean 

 classification. As a pupil of Needham and indirectly of Comstock, 

 I was brought up on eight orders in place of the Nciiroptera, and 

 on regarding Forficulidae as distinct from the Orthoptera. When 

 I came upon the older classification on arrival in Africa, it struck 

 me as a most peculiar " lumping "of diverse material. 



Let us first consider these groups in respect to metamor- 

 phosis. One set of families, . typified by the Sialididae and 

 Myrmeleonidae, show " complete," or three-stage metamor- 

 phosis. There is no approach to it among the other families 

 now under consideration, so far as I can discover. Now this 

 character alone should, if we follow accepted canons of entomo- 

 logy, demarcate this group as an order. Lang, in 1889, and Com- 

 stock, in 1895, recognised this, and limited the term Neuroptera 

 to this group as an order. Handlirsch, 1908, and Enderlen, 1903, 

 uphold this grouping, though adding more cumbrous names. 



The testimony of Handlirsch in its favour, based on fossil 

 insects, and that of Crampton, based on comparative anatomy, 

 should convince us of the justness of this grouping. 



Superficially akin to the Neuroptera thus delimited are the 

 Odonata. This group, however, becomes less and less like the 

 Neuroptera as it is studied. The metamorphosis here is in two 

 stages only, but in two sharply separated stages. The genitalia are 

 unique among insects, in that the males possess accessory organs 

 on the second abdominal segment. The nymph is distinctly more 

 near the primitive adult forms of the Aptera than is the Neurop- 



* Entomological News, June and July. 1916. 



