336 
CLASS VIII. 
without occasioning much confusion. Linn«us referred these flies 
to the genus Musca. By their antenne they approach the last 
family of the diptera, the NVemocera, in which there is constantly 
found a great number of joints, whilst the rest of the families have 
ordinarily three alone. At the same time the majority of writers 
consider the antenne of the Motacantha to be three-jointed in like 
manner, in which view the last joints are merely noted as rings in 
the terminal joint. But there is much that is uncertain and arbi- 
trary here. That the seta of the Athericera may be counted as a 
joint of the antenna, and that it is not separated by any sharp 
boundary from a stylus, which is itself often jointed also, will be 
readily admitted by every one who has not studied nature from 
books alone. The true place of the Votacantha in a natural system 
cannot in any case be far from Tabanus, although some only agree 
with Zabani in the metamorphosis, the genus Pachystomus for in- 
stance (LATREILLE Genera Crust. et Ins. iv. pp. 286, 287), the properly 
so-named Yylophagi, and perhaps Cenomyia (see WEstwoop, Jntrod. 
to modern Classif: of Insects, u. p. 535). Most of the species, on the 
other hand, the species of all the genera which establish the essen- 
tial type of this family, do not cast their skin. Under the skin of 
the larva, which however does not, as occurs in Athericera, contract 
itself to a ball, the pupa is formed. Some larve live underground, 
others in decayed wood, others in water. 
The antenne are mostly cylindrical or conical, sometimes club- 
shaped, and seldom longer than the head; this last is a semi-round, 
of which the eyes in the male occupy almost the whole bulk; there 
are three ocelli. The body is flat; the wings are long and cross 
one another, lying flat on the abdomen, and mostly leaving its sides 
uncovered. 
A. Antenne mostly with ten joints, the last eight confluent into 
a single subulate body, style none. 
+ Antenne not longer than head. 
Cenomyta Latr. (Sicus Fase.) Scutellum bidentate. 
Sp. Canomyia ferruginea Meic., Europ. zweifl. Ins. 1. Tab. 12; Dumer. 
Cons. gén. s.l. Ins. Pl. 48, fig. 3. ; 
Xylophagus Meie. Scutellum unarmed. 
AX ylophagus Wrstw. First joint of antenne elongate. 
Sp. Xylophagus ater Mutc., Europ. zweifl. Ins. 1. Tab. 12, fig. 14; Empis 
subulata Panzur, Deutschl. Ins. Heft 54, no. 23. 
sce 
