176 INJURIOUS AND USEFUL INSECTS 



Orthopterous ; the antennse are long, many-jointed, and 

 very like those of a cockroach or cricket. The wings 

 are peculiar, and it is almost solely on this account that the 

 earwigs are often placed in a separate order. The fore wings 

 form elytra or wing-covers ; they meet along a straight line, 

 as in true beetles, and are short, as in rove-beetles. Beneath 

 the wing-covers the flying wings are folded, a small part 

 being regularly exposed, which is instantly detected by its 

 brownish colour when the wing is expanded. The wings 

 are rarely spread for flight; at such times they are seen to 

 be of oval shape, not unlike the human ear; numerous veins 

 radiate from a stiff plate close to the articulation with the 

 thorax, and support the transparent membrane. When the 

 flight is over, it is a task of difficulty to pack the wings neatly 

 away. First, the radiating veins collapse fan wise, then the 

 wing is twice folded in opposite directions and gathered 

 beneath the elytra. It is said that the flexible abdomen is 

 bent forwards over the back to assist in expanding and folding 

 the wings. Earwigs are seldom seen to fly, but cases are 

 related in which they have stuck to newly pitched palings 

 during the night, the wings sometimes remaining expanded. 

 Some other species of earwigs, and especially the small dung- 

 earwig. Labia minor, fly freely by day. 



The forceps with which the abdomen terminates is an 

 unusual feature in insects, and only one other instance 

 (Japyx) can be quoted ; the cerci, so common in Orthoptera 

 and other orders, seem to be answerable parts, and in one 

 Ceylonese earwig cerci actually undergo transformation into 

 forceps during the course of the life-history, the blades of 

 the forceps being the enlarged basal joints of the cerci.* 

 The functions of the forceps are still doubtful ; it is present 

 in both sexes, and in wingless as well as in winged species. 

 When attacked, the earwig seeks to defend itself by directing 

 the forceps towards the aggressor and nipping with it, but 

 in an ineffective manner. The forceps is usually larger, more 

 curved, and especially more variable in the male than in the 

 female. Bateson finds it singularly variable in size, as is not 

 unusual with organs of extraordinary development. In the 

 earwigs of the Fame Islands, which are present in enormous 

 numbers, forming almost continuous sheets under every stone 

 * Green on Dyscritina, Tr. Ent. Soc. , 1898, p. 385 and plate. 



