584 PROF. WESTWOOD ON SOME 



to the insect in Sir John Lnbbock's memoir, had it not been that the difference in the 

 number of joints in its antennae above noticed would not allow it to be arranged with 

 the other Polynemce, the number of joints of those organs in the Proctotrupidse affording 

 the principal characters for generic classification. Hence I should prefer to arrange 

 Sir J. Lubbock's insect in Haliday's genus Anaphes, since it has 12-jointed male and 

 9-jointed female antenna?, as in that genus, notwithstanding that Anaphes is placed in a 

 section having the abdomen sessile or subsessile, whilst it is pedunculated in Polynema ; 

 but the figure of the female given by Sir J. Lubbock (pi. xxiii. fig. 2) shows so small 

 an amount of pedunculation as to throw doubt on this point ; and it will be seen that 

 the wings of P. natans (figs. 4 & 5) agree exactly with those of Anaphes (figs. 8 & 9) *. 



With regard to the natatorial habits of this curious insect, I may observe that the long 

 fringe of fine hairs along the margins of the wings is admirably adapted to retain a 

 bubble of air, needed for the respiration of the insect under water, which, as Sir John 

 Lubbock observes, takes place through spiracles in the usual manner. M. Victor 

 Audouin showed how this was effected in an insect belonging to the family Carabidse 

 and genus JEpus, which passed a considerable portion of its existence in salt water 

 beneath high- water mark, and which was clothed with long setse ; and it is in like manner 

 owing to the sericeous covering of the Argyroneta that the diving-bell spider is able to 

 subsist under water. 



It is a curious analogy that whilst these insects, the most minute of the Hymenoptera, 

 should be furnished with these beautifully fringed wings, the most minute species of the 

 Coleopterous order (viz. the Trichopterygia) should also have their wings similarly 

 fringed ; no one, however, as far as I am aware, has ever observed a Trichopteryx under 

 Water ; and it may be suggested that the fringe of hairs in that genus is used as a supple- 

 ment to the narrow elongated wings in effecting the ordinary flight of the Beetle. 



The generic name Mymar has been retained for the singular little insect figured by 

 Curtis under the name of 



Mymar pulchelltjs (Plate LXXIII. fig. 3). Brit. Ent. pi. 411. 



This insect has 13-jointed antennae in the male and 9-jointed in the female, with the fourt 

 joint remarkably elongated and slender ; the fore wings forming a long and filiform thread, 

 terminated by a dilated oval membrane (like a boatman's paddle), which is deeply fringed 

 with hairs, whilst the hind wings are reduced to a short rigid bristle. The tarsi are 

 4-jointed; and the abdomen is fixed to the thorax by a long slender peduncle. As Mr. 

 Curtis figured the female of this insect, I have thought it advisable to give a figure of 

 the opposite sex (having taken specimens of both sexes by sweeping grass and low plants 

 on a hot bank near Richmond Park), as well as to show its difference from another 

 species of the genus, discovered in Ceylon by Mr. Staniforth Green, as well as from the 

 still more remarkable species collected in St. Helena by the late T. V. Wollaston. 



* If this proposal as to P. natans being placed in the genus Anaphes be rejected, I beg to suggest that a new- 

 generic name be given to it, and would carry out Sir J. Lubbock's original intention, by giving to it the generic name 

 of Valkerella. 



