114 



THE DRAGON FLY. 



The Libellulidse, or family of Dragon flies, and the Ephtfmer- 

 idae, or May flies (Fig. 140), are the most characteristic of the 

 Neuroptera, or veiny-winged insects. This group is a most 



interesting one to the 

 systematist, as it is 

 composed of so many 

 heterogeneous forms 

 which it is almost 

 impossible to classify 

 in our rigid and at 

 present necessarily 

 artificial systems. 

 "We divide them into 



families and sub-fam- 

 138. Diplax Elisa. 



ilies, genera and sub- 

 genera, species and varieties, but there is an endless shifting 

 of characters in these groups. The different groups would seem 

 well limited after studying certain 

 forms, when to the systematist's sor- 

 row, here comes a creature, perhaps 

 mimicking an ant, or aphis, or other 

 sort of bug, or even a butterfly, and 

 for which they would be readily mis- 

 taken by the uninitiated. Bibliogra- 

 phers have gone mad over books that 139. Nannophya bella. 

 could not be classified. Imagine the despair of an insect-hunter 

 and entomophile, as he sits down to 

 his box of dried ueuroptera. He seeks 

 for a true neuropter in the white ant 

 before him, but its very form and 

 habits summon up a swarm of true 

 ants ; and then the little wingless book 

 louse (Atropos, Fig. 141) scampering 

 irreverently over the musty pages of 

 his Systema Naturae, reminds him 

 of that closest friend of man Pedic- 

 ulus vestimenti. Again, his studies 

 lead him to that gorgeous inhabitant 

 of the South, the butterfly-like Ascalaphus, with its resplendent 

 wings, and slender, knobbed antennae so much like those of 

 butterflies, and visions of these beautiful insects fill his mind's 



140. May Fly. 



