2 16 
SYSTEMATIC ARRANGEMENT. 
gate, probably exceeding every other assemblage o< 
the insect tribes. In this country, not more than 
about fifty indigenous Orthoptera have hitherto been 
detected, and it is not likely that any considerable 
number have escaped the researches of modern 
collectors. 
Although these insects must, of course, present a 
pretty general agreement in all essential parts of 
structure sufficient to justify their arrangement in the 
same division of their class, they are certainly very 
dissimilar in external aspect. The genera For- 
ficula, Blatta, Locusta, and Phasma, bear almost as 
little outward resemblance to each other as the species 
of any two separate orders. It was this circumstance 
that led Dr. Leach to propose its division into three 
different orders, Dermaptera, including Forficula ; 
Dictyoptera, including Blatta, and distinguished by 
the tegmina overlapping each other on the back; 
the other tribes to be referred to Orthoptera. The 
first of these has been since admitted by some authors 
to the rank of a separate order ; among others, by 
Mr. Westwood, who names it Euplexoptera , because 
the term Dermaptera is said to have been completely 
misapplied by English Entomologists, having been 
originally proposed for the Cimicidae. Notwithstand- 
ing the peculiarities in its structure which have led 
to this step, it is difficult, we think, to examine the 
earwig without being convinced that it is essentially 
an Orthopterous insect ; and as that order must, in 
any case, be defined with considerable latitude, it 
can scarcely be regarded as an undue extension of it 
