226 Mr. E. Newman's Memorandum 



the economy of the animal, the definite function which these 

 organs are specially created to perform. It must not be supposed 

 that, in making this assertion, I either overlook or undervalue 

 the researches of Latrielle, Herold, Oken, Chabrier, Jurine, 

 Audouin, Robineau-Desvoidy and Macquart ; but those entomo- 

 logists, who arc familiar with the works of these eminent authors, 

 will recollect, that with the single, and, I may say, singular excep- 

 tion of Oken, there is scarcely an attempt made to work out con- 

 clusions, leaving these rather to be inferred from names than en- 

 forced by the synthesis of details. Leach, with that intuitive 

 perception of truth which is the distinguishing characteristic of 

 his multifarious labours, called them pterygostea or wing-bones ; 

 and tiie observations of Cliabrier, Robineau-Desvoidy and Mar- 

 quart most imdcsignedly corroborate the conclusion which these 

 terms imply : each of these authors adduces satisfactory evidence 

 that the rays perform the office of wing-bones, without announcing 

 that conclusion ; each seems to unveil truth without perceiving 

 her. Others dwell, more or less emphatically, on some func- 

 tion going on within the ray ; as if the ray had no other office 

 than to perform that function — as if they believed that a man 

 lived that he might breathe and feel, or that his blood might cir- 

 culate, instead of adopting the more simple and obvious conclusion 

 that it was ordained for these functions to be carried on in order 

 that he might live. 



One class of observers finds the wing-rays to be traversed by 

 tracheae, and hence concludes they arc organs of respiration : 

 another asserts they are permeated by nerves, and thinks this a 

 warranty for giving them the name of nerves ; while a third dis- 

 covers in them channels through which blood circulates, and hence 

 other writers have called them veins. Now, 1 raise no objection 

 to receiving the evidence of these observers ; on the contrary, I 

 can bear willing testimony to the existence of channels for the 

 passage of both air and blood ; still I reject, because it were most 

 illogical and unphilosophical to accept, either of the three hypo- 

 theses which Entomologists have founded on these observations, 

 and which severally supposed the rays to be branchiae, nerves 

 and veins. 



The breathing hypothesis, though, perhaps, not originated, was 

 warmly advocated by Oken, who, having satisfied himself that the 

 tracheae really traversed the rays, and thus unquestionably esta- 

 blished a connexion between the wing and the process of aeration, 

 concluded that the wing was an external naked branchia to whose 

 functions were superadded that of flight. We have been so ac- 



