PHRYGANEID^}. 615 



the Spring-tails (Podura) , which leap by means of the long ovi- 

 positor, and corresponding male organs, bent beneath the body. 



Dr. Fitch has described two forms of these winter insects 

 which, like Podura, occur in moss and are found leaping on the 

 snow. Boreus nivoriundus is about one-seventh of an inch 

 long, and is reddish, with a bronze tinge, while B. brumalis is 

 entirely brassy-black, and is a still smaller species. 



We must not pass over the singular genus Merope, which is 

 interesting in this connection. It has no ocelli, while the 

 compound eyes are large, reniform and united on the top of 

 the head. The antennae are short and thick, narrowed at the 

 apex, while the wings are broad, with numerous transverse 

 veins, and the male abdomen has large forceps. The Merope 

 tuber of Newman is very rare. It is clay yellow (luteous), and 

 expands nearly an inch. Hagen remarks that "the genus and 

 species are very singular and abnormal ; perhaps the most re- 

 markable of all hitherto known Neuroptera. It certainly be- 

 longs to the Panorpina." 



PHRYGANEID^E Latreille. Some of the members of this 

 family bear a striking resemblance to the smaller moths, such 

 as the Tineidoi. As characterized briefly by Dr. Hagen, 

 their bodies are compressed, cylindrical ; the head is free, an- 

 tennae long, thread-like, the mouth is imperfectly developed, 

 and the labial palpi are triarticulate. The prothorax is small ; 

 the wings longer than the body, with few transverse veins, 

 while the posterior wings have the anal space large, plicated 

 (rarely absent), and the tarsi are five-jointed. In all these 

 characteristics, together with the cylindrical form of the larva, 

 the quiescent pupa which is very much like that of a moth with 

 its wings and limbs free, instead of being soldered together, 

 and in the habits of the larva, which in some genera resemble 

 those of the Sialidce, this family stands above the Neurop- 

 tera to be hereafter mentioned, and in a serial arrangement, 

 such as we are forced to make in our books, this seems to us 

 to be their proper place, while in nature they appear to us to 

 stand off by themselves parallel with the Sialidce and 

 Hemerobidce, certain genera of which, in the imago state 

 (such as Coniopteryx) , they closely resemble, while they seem 



