524 SUPPLEMENT 



beyond the end of the siphon ; but the upper digit is curved 

 towards the internal side of these organs. The species which 

 furnished these details is found in the seas of Australasia. 

 (PhalangioidesJ. Its body is entirely of an obscure brown, 

 and five lines in length. The feet are about three times as 

 long, a little hairy, with the fii'st two articulations, as well as 

 the fifth and sixth, terminated by some salient angles, in the 

 form of conical tubercles; these are visible at the superior 

 extremity of the fifth. 



The genus Nymphon was at first confounded with that of 

 jyhalangium, and subsequently with that of pycnogonum. 

 Fabricius placed it among the diptera ; but in one of his later 

 works, in which he has more especially treated of the insects 

 of that order [Systema antUatorum) he neither mentions this 

 genus, nor that of pycnogonum. He neither says any thing 

 about it in his System of Rhyngotes, which silence may be 

 attributed either to negligence, or to an intention of this 

 naturalist, of forming a particular order of these animals. 



Olivier placed the nymphons in this third section of the 

 order aptera, taking for antennae the parts which are now con- 

 sidered as palpi. He also considered that the two feet which 

 exclusively carry the eggs, were not less genuine feet than the 

 others, and thus extended the total number of those organs of 

 locomotion to ten ; and then resting on some other approxi- 

 mations founded on habits, he was induced to believe, that 

 these animals have more affinity with the Crustacea than with 

 the arachnida. M. Savigny appears to have adopted the 

 same opinion, or at least to think that the nymphons form 

 the passage from the cyami, a genus of Crustacea, to the 

 arachnida. It is evident, he says, that the nymphon has lost 

 the antennae, the composite eyes, and the masticatory organs 

 of the cyamus ; but it appears equally certain that it has pre- 

 served the fourteen feet. When we consider, he adds, the 

 changes which take place externally, in the genera which con- 



