1897.] Entomology. 163 
; Zoological News.—According to F. Neri,’ who has been study- 
ing the beaks of cephalopods, these structures are composed of fibrous 
cuticular lamin, which chemically are not chitinans but keratinous. 
The upper part is encrtisted with lime. 
The results of the Austrian deep sea expeditions of 1890-4 show, ac- 
- cording to Dr. R. Sturany,’ that the eastern portions of the Mediter- 
ranean is much poorer in deep sea shells than the western basin, and 
further, that the fauna is doubtless of Atlantic origin. 
ENTOMOLOGY. 
The American Spring-tail.—This very anomalous little insect 
(Lepidocyrtus americanus Marlatt) measuring scarcely more than one- 
tenth of an inch, silvery gray in color, with purple or violet markings, 
may be frequently observed in houses. In common with the silver fish, 
it belongs to the order of insects known as Aptera (wingless), from the 
fact of their having no vestige of wings throughout life. 
The simple structure of these insects, and particularly their resem- 
blance to the larval state of winged insects, has led to the belief that 
they are the primitive forms of insect life. That this is true is, however, 
y no means certain, and they may rather be degraded or debased ex- 
amples of some of the higher orders of insects. The species figured 
herewith is not infrequently found in dwellings in Washington, but is 
apparently undescribed, and, in fact, little is known of the American 
species. It is, however, closely allied to a European form (L. cervicalis), 
often found in cellars, and figured by Sir John Lubbock in his mono- 
graph on these insects. Another allied European species (Seira domes- 
tica) has been named from the fact of its being a frequenter of houses. 
These insects belong to the suborder Collembola, which (following 
Sharp) is distinguished from the other suborder of Aptera, Thysanura, 
by having but five body segments instead of ten, and possessing a very 
peculiar ventral tube on the first segment, and commonly also a term- 
inal spring, by means of which these creatures leap with great agility, 
and from*which they take their common name of “ spring-tails.” 
TAtti Soc. Tasc. Sci, Nat., x (1896), J. BR. M. S., p. 401. 
*S. B. K. Akad. Wiss. Wein., 1896. J. R. M. S., p. 400. 
| Edited by Clarence M. Weed, New Hampshire College, Durham, N. H. 
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