Description of a new Strepsipterous Insect. 51 



V. Description of a new Strepsipterous Insect. By Robert 

 Tetnpleton, Esq., R. A. 



[Read 5th March, 1838.] 



Having, wlillst at Rio Janeiro, caught a Sphex in whose abdo- 

 men was inserted the full grown pupa of a Xcnos, I placed it in 

 spirits with the intention of examining it on my arrival at Colombo. 

 Many things combined to make me regard this little treasure with 

 peculiar interest. I heretofore had only met with an Elenchus 

 found in Ireland, and with that which I discovered in the island of 

 Mauritius, described in a former volume of these Transactions, 

 and its minute size threw a veil over many interesting particulars, 

 but I had now hopes of clearing these up to my satisfaction, from 

 the large dimensions, comparatively speaking, of the present spe- 

 cimen ; and as the genus was as yet meagre in species, though its 

 congeners, thanks to British industry, were now including very 

 respectable numbers, I was pleased at the prospect of adding an- 

 other. Besides, Latreille had grounded his change of the name 

 of the order on the details of this very genus, and most possibly 

 some peculiarity of form, some development which we had not 

 found to pertain to Stylops or Elenchus, might have appeared to 

 sanction it, or at least account for the difference of opinion. I 

 need not say how much I was gratified in perceiving that there 

 was no grounds whatever for the alleged anterior origin of the 

 elytra, even with the latitude which Kirby himself admitted; 

 and in fact, instead of even an approximation to the assigned 

 position, that a wide membranous space intervened, cutting off 

 all immediate connection with the anterior coxaj, so that their 

 origin as elytra must be considered perfectly normal : one thing 

 I was struck with in my contemplation of these little rudimentary 

 bodies, how singularly happy was Kirby's name of the order, as 

 expressive of the appearance they present in this genus, the 

 twisting being in fact their most peculiar character. They are 

 not so broadly spatulate, in proportion to the stipes, as in our 

 English genera, but each appears like a short ribbon, the one end 

 of which was twisted over at right angles to the other. I remem- 

 ber when I first saw them in Elenchus, being puzzled to conceive 

 how the twisting could have been selected by Kirby as a dominant 

 quality sufficient to fix the name of the order, but here it is re- 

 markably apparent and expressive ; and as every one must be 

 satisfied that the prior name was on the continent too hastily re- 



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