270 Miscellaneous. 



outermost layer of chitinous mcinbraue (last skin), which, at an 

 early date, pari passu with the formatiou of the new antennae, tends 

 to separate off from tlie rest, and thereafter serves as a capsule or 

 sheath wherein the two series of pectinations are developed by a 

 process of budding from the antennal segments between the basal 5 

 and the apical 12-15; that as the pectinations grow they press upon 

 60 as to distend the walls of the sheath, completely obliterating all 

 traces of its previous segmentation ; and that if the sheath be care- 

 fully dissected away when distention of its walls has proceeded 

 almost to the bursting-point (last moult), the completely bi])ecti- 

 nated antenna of the adult male is disclosed, but with the teeth of 

 each comb all glued and compressed together and with the two 

 striated plates thus formed apposed to one another at their free ends, 

 so as to enclose a compressed spindle-shaped cavity. — Proceedhvjs of 

 the Asiatic Society of Benyal, December 1876. 



On the Poioer 2'>ossessed by certain Mites, with or rvithout MoutJis, of 

 liviivj without Food through entire Phases of their Existence or even 

 during their whole Lives. By M. Megxin. 



The specimens of Ixodes found adhering to animals, to whatever 

 species they may belong, are always fecundated females — a fact 

 which the author has ascertained by the examination of hundreds 

 of individuals obtained from dogs, cattle, sheep, horses, different 

 species of rodents, birds, reptiles, &c. lie lias frequently found 

 adhering to the lower surface of these sucking females, another very 

 different small Ixodes, which is entirely coriaceous, and is the male, 

 the lip of wliich, forming an obtuse triangle with salient lateral 

 angles, is introduced into the subthoracic vulva of the female, and 

 serves as a guide to the penis (which emerges from its base), and at 

 the same time as a means of firm sexual union instead of the copu- 

 latory suckers met with in many other mites. 



The Ixodes are oviparous, and deposit a considerable number of 

 eggs, not by the mouth as Latreille believed, on the testimony of 

 Chabrier, but by a subthoracic vulva which opens close to the base 

 of the rostrum, as demonstrated by M. Lucas (Ann, Soc, Ent. 

 Franc. 1836, p. 630) ; but the mode of life and organization of the 

 larvae are quite unknown. The author found on an African ox an 

 enormous female Ixodes ready to lay, and was thus enabled to study 

 her numerous progeny. Ectween May 22 and June 23 this female 

 laid 12,000 eggs filled with a brownish j-eUow vitelline matter, 

 composed of granular polyhedric or rounded cells of very variable 

 diameters. The average diameter of the ovospherical eggs was 

 A millim. 



The eggs hatched between July 25 and August 9, producing very 

 active hexapod larvae, with the rostrum apiiarently complete, an 

 oval-triangular ccphalothoracic plastron, furnished with a pair of 

 eyes as in the motlier, but quite destitute of stigmata and of the 

 trachearj' respiratory apparatus so visible in the adults. Five or 

 six days befoie hatching, when the egg appeared still three fourths 



