42 FOSSIL INSECTS OF THE BRITISH COAL MEASURES. 



neuration is in the form of a meshwork, except in the intercostal area, where are 

 the transverse cross-nervures already noted. 



Much less of the right wing remains than of it.s fellow, but sufficient is present 

 to show that the neuration was not quite the same. The median ends in five 

 divisions in place of six, and the cubitus has seven final branches instead of six. 

 The greatest width of the wing- is along a line drawn from the outer margin to the 

 middle of the cubital area on the inner margin, the width bein<-- 40 mm. The 

 .absence of the apex in each wing is unfortunate, as it renders the outline of the 

 whole wing a little uncertain. The shape of the nodule indicates that very little 

 of the wings is missing, if they were wholly included in the nodule, as seems 

 probable. The somewhat semicircular inner wing-margin and the short wide 

 wings indicate a broadly rounded wing-apex. 



Affinities. — The interstitial neuration is much like that of Hypermegethes. The 

 great width of the winsrs is a character usually associated with the hind-wings of 

 members of the family Lithomantidse, although in this case the wings lack the 

 distal attenuation noticed in the hind-wings of that family. With Titanodictya 

 jucunda, Scudder, there is a close relationship, both in the general character of 

 the main veins, the interstitial meshwork in all areas other than intercostal and 

 subcosta-radial, and in the presence of the same oblique cross-nervures in the 

 intercostal area in these wings. 



The true systematic position of the genus seems to lie between the Lithoman- 

 tidae and the genus Titanodictya, and closest to the latter. Because of the greater 

 development of a meshwork neuration between the main veins, and the limitation of 

 cross-nervures to the intercostal area, I regard this genus as more primitive than 

 any of the Lithoniantida?, but closely related thereto. 



Family Lithojiantid.e, Handlirsch. 



1906. Handlirsch, Proc\ U.S. National Mus., vol. xxix, p. 67o ; also Die Fossilen Insekton, p. 82. 



This family is closely allied, by wing-structure, to the Dictyoneuridae. The 

 branching of the main veins has proceeded further than in the Dictyoneuridae, and 

 the body, where it has been preserved, shows striking differences. The family is 

 represented in the Coal Measures of Great Britain and North America and in the 

 Upper Carboniferous of continental Europe. 



Genus LITHOMANTIS, Woodward. 

 1<s7(j. Lithomantis, H. Woodward. Quart. Joum. Geol. Soc, vol. xxxii, p. GO. 



Generic Characters. — Large insects with two pairs of Hying wings; the hinder 

 pair double the width of the anterior pair, 1'rothorax produced into a central 



