420 
THE MEDITERRANEAN NATURALIST 
“Whilst we may not be permitted to use the 
term “legs” and whilst the nameless obscure ap- 
pendages are, so to speak, most often invisible to 
the naked eye, they are nevertheless existing facts 
as rudimentary propellers, and when the larva 
leaves its juicy host for a final pedestrian tour, it 
does certainly use them to a certain extent, awk- 
wardly ‘tis true — but there nature does all things 
well! This maggot is not provided with useless ap- 
pendages. AH its strength is centred in the head — 
which depend only on the tail for one movement — 
spring assisting — around which the body would j 
revolve on a smooth surface unless some ba- j 
lancing assistance were provided. Perhaps j 
before apricots and peaches were bitten by the j 
teeth of a man, Ceratitis was a happy well-built ! 
long-legged maggot. Its legs have gone. The j 
stumps alone remain and they are of use but once ! 
in a life-time — in walking to the mausoleum. 1 
should describe the larva as having tea pairs of 
submerged legs; seven pairs palpable under high 
microscopic power, (1) diminishing toward the 
head. The two powerful and very prominent 
black hooks are propelled by parallel sinews, 
levered about by muscular adjuncts and as- 
sisted at either side or upon either shoulder by a 
ninefingered hand, the digits being narrowest 
at the base. It is likely that these hands 
are really used by the maggot for balancing 
its body upon the semi-liquidized masses of con- 
gregated particles, whilst the hooks are engaged 
in ripping down the juicy food. I do not perceive 
any connection between these remarkable provi- 
sions and the power of springing, which is referred 
to by Prof. Westwood as being similar to that ex- 
ercised by the cheese hopper, Piophila casei , a 
larva of another dipterous fly, belonging to the 
same family, {Mmcidoe ), as our common house-fly. 
In the la rval stage I cannot discern a single weak 
point up to the period of the maggot’s departure 
from the fruit, to favour our work of prevention 
or destruction, as the grub is merely a more pro- 
nounced epitome of its first state, and an active 
destroyer instead of a dormant traitor. 
Viewed with the naked eye or under low 
microscopic power, the maggot is decidedly 
un-attractive and ordinary, but under higher 
( 1 ) Slight swellings may be seen with the naked 
eye. 
powers where the partnership and connection of 
the two locomotive provisions are conspicuously 
portrayed, where the “mouth armature, two cur- 
ved hooks, curious hand-like processes, by which 
they cling on to give themselves a purchase to 
work with the cutting hooks” {Dr. Chute) the mar- 
vellous maze of an intricate nerve system, [the 
alimentary canal and rudimentary legs are all 
clearly delineated], we can only exclaim “every 
natural atom is a prodigy of mechanical skill!” In 
science there is a deeper depth beyond the deepest 
known depth, a bottom we can never reach. 
Dipterous chrysalids do not as a rule impress 
our minds with extensive feelings of admiration, 
as do some butterfly pupae, nor call forth any pe- 
culiar necessity for observation in the order of in- 
sects of which Ceratitis is a noteworthy repre- 
sentation. “The pupa is a small, hard, brown, 
oval body, the outer surface scarely indicating any 
traces of articulation, being the dried skin of the 
larva, within which the real pupa is enclosed.' 
Thus writes Prof. Westwood, and there is little to 
add. It is of an amorphous kind bearing no indi- 
cation of identity or resemblance to the imago. It 
neither eats, flies, leaps, nor runs. The abdomen 
has no power of movement independent of the 
thorax, and as a buried being, this brown, ordi- 
nary, dead yet living creature, has no need for 
locomotive organs. It silently awaits a natural 
law until the final completion and expiration of 
its enforced imprisonment developes aforce within, 
to break its bondage. When the fly emerges from 
the pupal coffin, we generally find an empty case 
broken in half, capped at either apex, and always 
spilt across, not lengthways. I have often seen 
the newly hatched fly walking up towards the top 
of my breeding-cage, and with its legs working off 
the empty encumbrance. Of course there are pre- 
sent, although almost invisible, strong articula- 
tions, which assist in the insect’s resurrection. 
There is no web spun by the larva. It has no 
function, and small discretion is used in the choice 
of a hiding place. By physical disability the grub 
is handicapped, and in that stage is possessed of 
few personal adornments, but in the grand consum- 
mation which now attracts us, we find glorious 
changes of structure, beauties and intricacies, not 
readily surpassed by one species of the order, The 
pupa is similar to Soronia. 
