clxxxvi Proposed Division of Neuroptera 



Characters of Ephemerina. 



Larva aquatic, breathes by means of external gills, which also serve 

 as organs of natatory locomotion : it has long filiform multiarti- 

 culate antennae, corneous but small and feeble mandibles, long 

 and strong legs, and three long filiform multiarticulate caudal 

 setae : it frequents the bottom of ponds, and especially of run- 

 ning streams, is fond of secreting itself under stones, and 

 appears to feed on the decomposing organic matter which min- 

 gles so largely in the sediment of all waters. 

 Pupa similar to the larva in its forms, habits, and food ; the rudi- 

 ments of the wings are however very perceptible at the posterior 

 angles of the wing-bearing segments : it attains its perfect state 

 by a double ecdysis ; after the first, the insect retains the soft 

 silky pellicle which invests a great number of insects, and which, 

 in all other cases, is shed with the pupa- case ; but, although 

 remaining in this pellicle, it assumes its final form, and {mira- 

 bile dictu /) acquires the power of flight : after a feeble flight 

 the insect settles, and in the course of a few hours divests itself 

 of the pellicle, and has then accomplished all its transformations. 

 Imago with very short 3-jointed antennae, the terminal joint longest, 

 and a mere seta : 3 ocelli : the mouth is so soft and fleshy as to 

 become amorphous after death, and its component parts totally 

 obliterated : Latreille and Savigny, our greatest cibarian ento- 

 mologists, examined the mouth of these insects, and the former 

 left descriptions, the latter figures, of its parts; but these do not 

 correspond, and I confess to my own entire inability to verify 

 their observations : the life of these insects being proverbially 

 short, and spent almost entirely either at rest or on the wing, 

 we may conclude that the imago does not feed, and hence, pro- 

 bably, the apparently imperfect development of the cibarian 

 organs : the prothorax is atrophied : the wings are much reti- 

 culated with veins, and very unequal in size, the fore wings be- 

 ing ample, the hind small, and sometimes totally wanting ; they 

 are held perfectly erect, meeting over the back when the insect 

 is at rest, like those of a butterfly : the flight is in the evening, 

 and in company, like that of some gnats, rising and falling, and 

 is remarkable for its extreme elegance : the wings appear to be 

 moved only in rising, the insect floating downwards by its own 

 weight, with motionless and semi-expanded wings: the legs are 

 simple and slender, the fore-legs longer and porrected in the 



