THE SCORPION-FLY. 16 



The Snake-flies, or Camel-flies (Rhaphidice) form a small genus which is now generally referred to 

 this family, but the position of which has given entomologists some trouble. They have a rather 

 large head, with smallish eyes and usually three ocelli, which is attached to a greatly elongated pro- 

 thorax by a thinnish neck, so that the head has considerable freedom of motion in a vertical direction. 

 The insect usually carries its long prothorax a little elevated, and its head bent down, very much 

 after the fashion of a snake with its head raised. The species are not numerous, and the greater part 

 of those known are inhabitants of Europe, chiefly in the southern parts. Four species live in 

 Britain. The larvae reside under the bark of trees, where they feed upon minute insects ; they have 

 a large prothorax like the perfect insect, and are tolerably active, often wriggling about in a serpentine 

 fashion. The pupa is not enclosed in a cocoon. 



FAMILY PANORPID^E. 



This family is a curious little group, characterised above all things by the perpendicularly- 

 placed and greatly elongated head, forming a regular beak, at the end of which the free 

 organs of the mouth are seen, namely, a pair of small toothed mandibles, the lobes of the 

 maxillse and the maxillary and labial palpi. The maxiila3 and labium are more or less united, 

 forming the lower surface of the beak. The insects have longish, filiform antennae, moderate, 

 oval eyes, usually three ocelli, a ring-shaped prothorax, and generally four precisely similar 

 wings, showing branched longitudinal veins, but very few cross veins. The legs are long, 

 sometimes much elongated. The larvae, so far as they are known, live in the earth, and are 

 like caterpillars in their general form ; they have a horny head, and three pairs of short, 

 thoracic legs ; their bodies consist of thirteen segments. The pupa resides in a little chamber 

 underground ; in its characters it resembles those of the other Neuroptera, and it has no cocoon. 



The species of this family are not numerous, but they are pretty generally distributed 

 over the face of the earth, those of the more typical genera, however, being chiefly inhabitants 

 of the temperate parts of the northern hemisphere. They are predaceous in their habits, feeding 

 upon smaller and weaker insects, which they seize in various ways. Of the typical genus 

 Panorpa, the best known species is the Scorpion- 

 fly (P. communis), a common British insect, which 

 may be met with almost everywhere about hedge 

 banks. It is rather more than half an inch long, 

 shining black, with the scutellum and legs yellow, 

 the beak, and in the male the last three segments 

 of the abdomen, reddish. The wings are trans- 

 parent with dark brown spots, which are more or 

 less confluent, and generally form three dark bands. SCORPION-FLY, MALE AND FEMALE. 



The name of Scorpion-fly is given to this insect in 



allusion to a peculiarity of the male. In both sexes the segments of the abdomen beyond the sixth 

 become much more slender, and in the females all of them taper gradually towards the extremity, 

 which bears a pair of small three-jointed styles. In the male the seventh and eighth segments are 

 narrow, and generally carried more or less elevated, while the last joint is swelled into a sort of knob, 

 which bears a pair of forceps. When the insect is alive, with this slender tail and its inflated 

 termination raised above the general level of the body, the analogical resemblance to a Scorpion 

 is unmistakable ; the terminal swelling is, however, a far more innocent appendage than the 

 Scorpion's sting, and is only a clasping organ which comes into use during the union of the sexes. 



The common Scorpion-fly is active during the day, and may be found walking about 

 upon the leaves of the herbage in hedge-bottoms and on small bushes, usually in damp 

 situations. Its appearance as it stands upon a leaf is peculiarly brisk and wide awake, and 

 its movements are also lively. It usually pounces upon its prey by short quick flights, and 

 from some observations which have been recorded, it would appear to be a bold marauder, 

 sometimes attacking insects much larger than itself, and boring into them with its long beak. 

 The female, about four days after pairing, deposits, by means of the extensible terminal 

 joints of her abdomen, a mass of little white eggs in a small cavity in damp earth. In a 



