CHAPTER III. 



UPON THE CLASSIFICATION OF ACARINA IN GENEEAL AND 

 THE POSITION OF THE TYROGLYPHID^] THEREIN. 



IN Chapter IV of the first volume of my work on 

 British Oribatidas * I gave a history and summary of 

 the principal classifications of the Acarina which had 

 been published up to that time by specialists in the 

 study of the group, and in the second volume of the 

 same book (p. 583) I continued this history down to 

 the year 1888, in which that volume was issued. As 

 the present volume is one of the same series, it appears 

 desirable that this should be continued down to the 

 present date. The history was given with a view to 

 show the position of the Oribatidge in those classifica- 

 tions, but that of the Tyroglyphidae is equally well 

 shown ; it would, therefore, be waste of expense and 

 labour to repeat here what is to be found on this sub- 

 ject in the 1884 publication. I therefore only propose 

 to notice here such classifications as have been published 

 during the thirteen years which have elapsed since 

 that date, and are of sufficient scientific value to make 

 it advisable to refer to them ; they are but few. 



In 1891 Professor Geovanni Canestrini, of Padua, 

 published a careful and well-considered classification of 

 the Acarina. t Unfortunately the table at the end of 

 this does not explain the reasons or basis for the 

 various divisions, nor how each group is defined. This 

 want is fully and ably supplied in what may be called 



* London : Ray Society, 1884. 



f " Abbozzo del sistema acarologico," in ' Atti. 1st. Veneto.,' ser. 7, 

 t. ii, pp. 699725. Reprinted by the author in his ' Prospetto 

 dell' Acarofauna italiana,' pt. v (1892), Padua, pp. 563 -587. 



