ORDER V. 



NET-WINGED INSECTS (NEUROPTERA ). 



THE insects of this order are distinguished principally 

 by their delicate wings, which resemble the finest net- 

 work, and on this account they are called by the Germans 

 Florfliegen ("Gauze flies"). Their bodies are long, thin, 

 and soft; their wings, also, are long, narrow, and almost 

 transparent. They seem to be in continual motion like 

 swallows, and, catching their prey with their feet while fly- 

 ing, they devour it in the air. They generally deposit their 

 eggs in ponds, in which the larvae or grubs issuing from 

 them live one or two years, partly on water plants, and 

 partly on other aquatic insects, until they metamorphose 

 into a perfect winged insect, when they change their watery 

 element for a more ethereal one. 



All the insects of this order are not only innoxious, but 

 are decidedly beneficial to man, and as such deserve our 

 care and cultivation. 



The different genera belonging to this order are quite 

 numerous ; and as some of the modern German and French 

 entomologists proposed to unite several of them with the 

 order of Orthoptera, or Straight-winged Insects, our much- 

 lamented friend, Dr. Harris of Cambridge, violently opposed 

 such an innovatiop, and gave us his reasons for his opposi- 

 tion in the following letter, which, as it so well represents 

 the characteristics of the order we are describing, we shall 

 give nearly entire : 



"CAMBRIDGE, MASS., February 22, 1855. 

 " Professor Jaegar : 



"DEAR Sin, Your letter of the loth January has re- 



