206 
CENTIPEDES. 
the family Lithobiidce, the eyes consist of a cluster of ocelli on each side of the 
head, while in the other two there is only one pair of ocelli. Except in 
Cermcitobius, the coxas of the last five pairs of limbs are furnished with organs 
known as the coxal pores, which are the apertures of special glands. 
The members of this order are found in all temperate and tropical regions, 
living often in pairs under stones, logs of wood, etc. The species of Lithobius are 
particularly abundant, and reach their largest size in the temperate parts of the 
Northern Hemisphere. A few only have been recorded from India and Australia, 
but none occur in Africa south of the Sahara, nor, with the single exception of a 
possibly introduced species in South America. In the Southern Hemisphere the 
genus is largely replaced by LLenicops, which is represented in Europe and North 
America by a single small species, but has many larger forms in South Africa, 
Australia, New Zealand, and Chili. The single species of Cermatobius occurs in 
Halmahira, one of the Moluccas. There are about half a dozen species of 
Lithobius in the British Islands, one of 
the commonest and largest being L. 
forficatus, represented in the figure. 
Almost equally common and eq 
large, although seldom found close to 
houses, is L. variegatus, —a brightly- 
coloured species with banded legs,—which 
is confined to the British and Channel 
Islands. The largest known species is 
the handsome L. fasciatus, measuring 2 
inches in length, and occurring in many 
of the southern countries of Europe. In 
all cases the females—which may be recognised by the presence of a pair of dwarfed, 
claw-tipped appendages behind the last pair of legs—lay their sticky eggs one 
at a time, and roll them in the soil until they become coated with earth, and 
consequently protected from observation. The young, like those of Scutigera, 
are hatched from the egg with only seven pairs of legs, the remaining eight 
pairs being added during growth. The food of these centipedes consist of worms, 
insects, etc., which are killed by the poisonous bite of their destroyer. 
The second order, or Scolopendromorpha, contains the giants of the group, some 
of the tropical species of Scolopendra reaching a length of almost 12 inches. The 
legs vary in number from twenty-one to twenty-three pairs, and there are either 
nineteen pairs of stigmata, as in the aberrant genus Plutonium from Italy, or 
more usually nine or ten pairs situated upon the third, fifth, eighth (sometimes 
also the seventh), tenth, and alternate segments of even number. The eyes are 
either absent or consist of four ocelli on each side of the head, and the segments of 
the antennas vary in number from seventeen to twenty-nine. The members of 
this order are referable to four families, the Scolopendridce, Scolopocryptopidoe, 
Newportiidce, and Cryptopidce. Both the Scolopocryptojndce and Newportiidai 
have twenty-three pairs of legs, but in the latter, which is confined to the South 
American region, the legs of the last pair are clawless and have their terminal 
segments many jointed and evidently functioning as antennae, so that the 
