Tekebkantia. INSECTS. Neuropteka. 247 
side of the leaves. Passerini describes the Thrips as 
depositing in the month of April four or five eggs on 
each bud, and as the insects breed to the end of 
autumn, their numbers become excessive. 
Dr. Harris speaks of the peach-trees in the United 
States suffering at times severely from the attacks of 
a species of Thrips. They are found beneath the 
leaves in little hollows, caused by their irritating 
punctures. 
The following arrangement of the order is derived 
from Haliday’s latest views of the group, published 
at the end of the Catalogue of Homopterous Insects 
in the British Museum (part iv. ; 1852). Four well 
filled plates accompany this, which contain figures and 
dissections, and metamorphoses of the various genera. 
Mr. Haliday thus divides them : — 
Family I.— TUBULIFERA. 
Abdomen furnished with a tubular segment in both 
sexes, the female without a borer. Antennse eight- 
jointed. The insects walk slowly, and do not leap. 
Genus Idolothrips contains three species, natives 
of Australia. They are furnished with three ocelli, 
the anterior of which is distant from the others. One 
of these (I. spectrurri) is the largest of the group, being 
four lines and more long. It is figured on PL 5, fig. 10. 
Genus Phlceothrips ; nine species are described, 
some of which live in flowers, and others in clusters 
under bark. The ocelli are equidistant. 
Family II. — TEREBRANTIA. 
The females are furnished with a borer, which is 
compressed, sharp, and four-valved ; it is concealed in 
a ventral cut of the last segment of the abdomen. 
The antennse are generally nine-jointed. The insects 
of this family leap. 
In the first tribe {Stenoptera), so called from the 
slenderness of the wings, the borer of the female is 
curved inwards. 
The genus Heliothrips contains one species (FT. 
hcemorrlwidalis), which is brown, and has the tip of 
body reddish. This is the insect often called by 
nurserymen the “Thrip.” It is most destructive in 
hot-houses, attacking the leaves of plants. 
The genus Sericothrips, so called from its downy 
body, contains a very active species (<8. Staphylinus), 
often met with in the flowers of the Whin. 
In the genus Thrips the body is smoothish, Mr. 
Flaliday subdivides this into five sub-genera. One of 
these i^Aptinothrips') has not the slightest trace of 
wings. It was long before he found the male of this 
insect, and was almost induced to think that, like 
Cynips, the insect might be unisexual. At length, 
at the season of hay-harvest, he discovered the male, 
though it is so excessively rare that there is perhaps 
but one to several hundreds of the female. 
The Limothrips cerealius and its ravages have been 
alluded to above. 
Of Thrips proper, twenty-three species are described 
by Mr. Haliday; one of these {T. urticai) he describes 
as being very partial to yellow flowers, such as the 
Buttercups, Eschscholtzia, &c. 
In the second tribe (^Coleoptrata) the hemelytra are 
of the length of the abdomen, and are blunt and cori- 
aceous; hence the name. The borer of the female is 
recurved. 
The genus Melantlirips, so called from the deep 
black colour of the species, has the antennai with nine 
distinct joints. In the genus ALulothrips there are 
five joints. 
Order I.— NEUROPTEEA. 
This is a rather large and important order of four- 
winged insects, containing the voracious Dragon-flies, 
with their aquatic larvae ; the curious Aut-lions, the 
pitfalls of whose larvae are so interesting ; the Lace- 
winged flies, whose larvae are so useful in reducing the 
numbers of plant lice; the strange Scorpion flies, and 
other families. The following are the leading charac- 
ters of the order : — The mouth is furnished with trans- 
versely movable jaws. The wings, which are four in 
number, are generally large and beautifully netted with 
numerous areolets (hence the name Neuroptera) ; the 
hind pair are very seldom folded, and generally similar 
to the first pair. The larva has six jointed legs, and 
the pupa is various in the different families. In some 
it is quiescent, and has the limbs folded over the breast ; 
in others it is active, and resembles more or less nearly 
the perfect insect. These insects have no sting, and 
the body is generally long and slender, and of a soft 
consistence. Mr. Westwood, taking the transforma- 
tions as the ground of the distributions of these insects, 
forms them into two primary divisions : — ■ 
Div. 1. — Biomorphotic Neuroptera. — This 
division contains the Neuroptera with an active pupa, 
which undergo what Mr. Macleay has called a subsemi- 
complete metamorphosis. To this belong the Psocidcc 
and Termitidce, the larvte of which are terrestrial, and 
the Libellulidce, Epliemeridce, and Perlidce, which are 
aquatic in their preparatory states. 
Div. 2. — Subnecromorphotic Neuroptera. — 
This second division contains those Neuroptera which 
have quiescent and incomplete pupae, acquiring, how- 
ever, the power of locomotion shortly before they assume 
the perfect state. This division contains the families 
of the Ant-lions {Myrmeleonidce), Lace-winged flies 
(^Hemeroiiidce),tiX\dL the Sialidw, Panorpidee or Scorpion 
flies, Raphidiidee^ and Mantispidee. 
Family--TERMITIDA1 {White Ants). 
The White ants have been formed by some authors 
into a separate sub-order called Isojjtera, from the 
wings being of equal size. They form a strange 
family which has been latel}'- monographed by Dr. 
Hagen of Kbnigsberg. Each species of these insects is 
I 
