DIPTERA. 3g5 



watery fluid, whereby the thin transparent outer skin or cuticle 

 is elevated like a vesicle or blister, which occupies about 

 a fourth of the length of the worm on its under side, but 

 is much shorter on its back. The insect is now in its em- 

 bryo-pupa state, having lost its larva form and having not 

 yet assumed its pupa form. In the fluid contained in this vesi- 

 cle, the wings, legs and antennae of the future fly now begin 

 to be developed, whereby the sheaths of the wings at length 

 come to be discerned immediately under tlie skin. Tliis skin 

 is exceedingly thin, delicate and transparent, like the tunica 

 arachnoides of the human brain, a mere fllm, as thin as a spi- 

 der's web. Eventually the insect, by gently writhing, ruptures 

 this fllm at its anterior end, and gradually crowds it off" down- 

 Avards to the lower end of tlie vesicle, carrying the minute 

 black jaws of the larva witli it. It there remains, becoming 

 dry and torn into sin-eds which flake and fall oft' by the con- 

 tinued motions of the insect. At the same time from the 

 remainder of the surface not occupied by this vesicle, a still 

 more slight and delicate film, appearing as though the worm 

 had been wet in milk which had dried upon it, forming an ex- 

 ceedingly thin pellicle or scurf, becomes separated by the same 

 motions of the insect and drops oft' in minute scales scarcely 

 to be perceived with a magnifying glass. And now the insect 

 has acquired its perfect pupa form." 



Frederic Brauer has proposed in his "Monographic der 

 CEstriden," a division of the Diptera into two large groups. 

 This division is much more natural than the old one into those 

 with coarctate and obtected pupa?. The first group is the Z>?}> 

 tera orthorapha, comprising the Nemocera, or flies Avith long an- 

 tenuiB, together with the Stratiomyidoi, Xyloj^hagidce^ 

 Tabanidce, Acroceridce (.?), Bombylidce , Asilidce , 

 Leptidce, Therevidce, Empidce and Dolichopidca (pass- 

 ing over some small families whose metamorphoses are not 

 known). In these families the larva skin at the last moult 

 splits down along the middle of the back of the three thoracic 

 rings, while a transverse split on the first thoracic ring makes a 

 T-shaped fissure. Through this the mummy-like pupa with free 

 limbs escapes ; or it remains within the loose envelope formed 

 by the old larval skin, when this author calls it a "false pu- 

 pariura." 



