379 
Lianckan Society, 
between the cells, which open into follicles connected with sinuses 
in the granular tissue of the body, and that the orifices (the spiracles) 
at first very closely resemble the stomata of plants. The parietes of 
these follicles in Meloe are formed by aggregations of exceedingly 
minute, nucleated embryo- cells of rounded shape, and about one five- 
or one six-thousandth of an inch in diameter. 
The tegument of the head, and more especially that of the eye of 
the young Meloe was then examined, and the cornea, wdiich in this 
stage of the insect’s existence is a single structure, fitted only for 
near vision, was shown to be composed of numerous transparent der- 
mal cells, continuous with those which form the surface of the head, 
while the centre of the cornea, the axis of vision, is occupied by a 
single cell, more projecting and twice the size of those which sur- 
round it. 
The changes which take place in the relative development of dif- 
ferent parts of the tegument of the young Meloe, which lead to its 
entire alteration of form, were then pointed out, and shown to occur 
chiefly in the rapid growth of the dorsal region, w'hich from being 
originally the smallest, as it is the last-formed part of the body, be- 
comes the most voluminous, and occasions a complete alteration in 
the position and size of the limbs and in the entire form of the in- 
sect. 
The stages of this process and the formation of the dermo-skele- 
ton, the author proposed to be considered in the next section of this 
memoir. 
Nov. 16. — The Lord Bishop of Norwich, President, in the Chair. 
E. Doubleday, Esq,, F.L.S., read a paper “ On the Pterology of 
the Diurnal Lepldoptera, especially upon that of some genera of the 
Heliconidce 
After expressing his regret at the little attention bestowed in this 
country upon the anatomy of the Annulosa, the writer proceeded to 
remark that he was not aware that any author had recorded the fact 
of a sexual variation in the neuration of the wings of Lepidoptera, a 
fact extremely interesting from the light it throv/s on the homologies 
of the nervures and nervules. 
The variation takes place in the genera Itliomia, Mechanitis and 
Sais, all remarkable also for the great sexual variation in the struc- 
ture of the anterior legs, those of the males being the least de- 
veloped, those of the females the most developed, of any butterflies 
with suspended pupae. 
The state of atro))hy of the anterior feet of the males is not, he 
states, the consequence of excessive development of the other pairs 
of feet, or of any other organs, nor does it appear to depend on any 
])eculiar habits of the insect ; neither can the greater development 
of these feet in the females be accounted for by any difiference of 
habits. For the more developed anterior feet of some male Coleo- 
ptera, for the powerful jaws of the leaf-cutting or timber-boring bees, 
there are obvious uses ; but a greater dev^elopment in the one sex of 
organs almost atroph’ed in the other, wdiich still leaves them unfitted 
