326 
SYSTEMATIC ARRANGEMENT 
it is obvious that the number necessary to do this 
must be astonishingly great. About 1700 have been 
named as belonging to this country ; and it is pro- 
bable that they will ultimately be found not to fall 
short of 2000. 
Allusion has been already made to the injuries 
they commit, in the larva slate, both to our domestic 
animals and to agricultural produce; but the pur- 
poses to which they are subservient in the economy 
of nature, are highly important and beneficial. Many 
of the smaller birds, as well as some other of the 
higher animals, depend upon them almost exclusively 
for food, and they are the most efficient instruments 
employed by nature in removing both animal and 
vegetable substances when rendered offensive and 
unwholesome to other animals by decomposition. 
The most successful of the more recent investi- 
gators of this order are German and French Ento- 
mologists, particularly Meigeri, Fallen, Wiedeman, 
Macquart, and Robineau Desvoidy. The following 
is Macquart’s arrangement, slightly modified, for 
which we are indebted to Mr. Westwood’s useful 
text-book : * 
Section I. (Ovipara or Larvipora ; Dii’tera, Leach.) — Head 
distinct from the thorax ; sucker enclosed in a labial canal ; 
claws of the tarsi simple, or with one tooth ; the transfor- 
mation to the pupa state not taking place within the body 
of the parent. 
Division I. (Nemocera.) — Antenn® having six or more 
distinct joints ; palpi with four or five joints. 
* Page 420. 
