634 
ZOOLOGICAL LITERATURE. 
longitudinal vein, or the radial and cubital veins. When only a 
single inferior branch ia emitted by the subcostal vein, this is 
to be regarded as the cubital. Between the subcostal and the 
costal there ia another longitudinal vein, the mediastinal, which, 
however^ is frequently amalgamated with the subcostal. The 
space at the base of the wing between the costal and mediastinal 
veins is considered by Schiner to be of great importance in the 
interpretation of the Dipterous wing ; indeed he puts forward 
the hypothesis that it may represent the fore wings of insects of 
other orders. The further divisions of the radial and cubital 
veins, when such exist, do not require special names. For the 
second main stem Schiner proposes the name of postical vein ; 
it emits a branch above and below ; the upper branch is the 
discoidal, the lower the anal vein. These are the fourth, fifth, 
and sixth longitudinal veins of SchineFs former terminology. 
The discoidal vein has a remarkable tendency to divide, and by 
this means furnishes, in several of the more complicated wings, 
the chief part of the reticulation of the apical portion of the 
disc. The postical vein is frequently more or less branched ; a 
superior branch often unites it with the discoidal vein, enclosing 
a space which may be called the posterior basal cell. This 
superior branch of the postical may be called the posterior 
transverse vein. The anal vein sometimes runs simply to the 
margin of the wing, sometimes unites again with the postical, 
enclosing an anal cell. The thiid primary vein, when present, 
is the axillary vein. 
The cells are named from the veins enclosing them. The 
mediastinal cell is between the mediastinal and costal veins ; the 
next cell, parallel to this, enclosed by the subcostal, is the costal 
cell\ the subcostal cell is enclosed between the subcostal and 
radial veins ; and the cubital cell betw^een the cubital and radial 
(or, when the latter is absent, the subcostal) veins. The cell en- 
closed between the upper and lower primary veins and closed by 
the transverse vein is the anterior basal cell. The discoidal cell 
is situated on the disc of the wing below the transverse vein ; it 
is enclosed by the discoidal and postical veins and their branches, 
or by the former alone. The posterior marginal cells occupy 
the posterior margin of the. wing, and are bounded by the 
branches of the lower primary vein ; but the first and most im- 
portant of them is enclosed between the discoidal and cubital 
veins, the transverse vein, and the margin of the wing. 
The Recorder has analyzed this paper of Schiner^s at some 
length, as it seems to offer a terminology for the venation of 
the wings of Diptera far preferable to any that has preceded 
it. In its application, however, as far as we can judge from the 
excellent diagrammatic figures of wings given on Tafel 3, the 
author himself seems to be sometimes unsuccessful; the interpre- 
tation of the Stratiomyide wing (fig. G) and the Phoride wing 
