288 
MR. NEWPORT ON THE REPRODUCTION OF LOST PARTS 
3rd of August it underwent another change of covering, after which no difference 
could be perceived in the size of the reproduced and of the original legs. At this time 
my observations were discontinued. 
These facts sufficiently show that a power of reproducing lost parts is quite common 
to the Lithobii, and the frequent occurrence of legs that have not their full size, in 
specimens of foreign Scolopendrce, lead to the conclusion that it is equally common to 
those animals. There are many instances of this in the collection in the British 
Museum, in the majority of which it is one of the posterior legs that has been re- 
produced. From the number of specimens I have met with in which this is the case, 
I have been enabled to arrive at the conclusion, that although reproduced limbs in 
these animals may ultimately attain the full size of the normal structures, they never 
acquire a perfectly normal development of all their parts, which are sometimes super- 
numerary, but more frequently are deficient in number, and are almost invariably 
atrophied. This is strikingly illustrated in the development of the spines with 
which the basal joints of the posterior legs of the Scolopendrse are armed. This fact is 
of consequence in a zoological point of view ; as these parts have recently been much 
depended on in the determination of species. It is also, perhaps, of some value in 
relation to the laws of development, since it is found to be equally constant, as I shall 
presently show, in the reproduced parts of the true Insecta. 
Insect a. 
Some experiments formerly made by Dr. Heineke* on the Blattee, have already 
shown that these insects, which do not undergo any metamorphosis but a change of 
tegument, have a power of reproducing the antennae in their young state. But no ex- 
periments were made by that naturalist to prove that the legs also are capable of being 
reproduced. Professor Muller^, however, first showed that the Phasmidce, which 
likewise undergo no transformation, can reproduce their legs, when lost at an early 
period. This has recently been fully confirmed by Mr. Fortnum, in the Diura vio- 
lescens, Gray, of Australia, as communicated by letter to the Rev. F. W. Hope^. 
I may also remark, that I have recently found a specimen of Phasma in the cabinets 
of the British Museum, in which the right anterior leg has been reproduced, in a 
large species (fig. 4.), Alopus cocophages , Gray, MSS., an insect from Navigator’s 
Island, destructive to the young buds of cocoa-nut trees. This instance affords a 
striking exemplification of the usually incomplete development of reproduced organs. 
Not only is the whole limb in this specimen much shorter than the corresponding one 
on the opposite side, but its third tarsal joint is absent, and the other joints are 
imperfectly formed. 
In order to ascertain whether reproduction of the limbs can take place in insects 
that undergo a complete metamorphosis in form, in habit, and mode of life, I have 
* Zoological Journal, vol. iv. p. 422. t Loc. cit. p. 405. 
I Proceedings of the Entomological Society of London, January 1, 1844. 
