228 
Journal New York Entomological Society. 
[Vol. VI. 
1 am thoroughly convinced that we can not, as yet, make any broad, 
universally applicable generalizations on this subject. The field is far 
too broad, the important and modifying factors are far too numerous 
and conflicting, the conditions vary far too widely to be thus compre¬ 
hended in any concise, unqualified formula. The only conclusion I 
can reach, as the result of my studies thus far, is that it is not safe to 
draw any conclusion at all. The vital point upon which the whole of 
Megnin’s theory of the fauna of exposed cadavers turns, is that the 
various insects appear in distinct “squads,” at definite and specified 
periods of cadaveric decomposition, and that they succeed each other 
in regular order. That this proposition does not in any particular ap¬ 
ply to the observations here noted is most evident from the following 
brief resume of the work, taking only the more important mites, bee¬ 
tles and flies : 
Acarina, 8 species found in 30 cases, interred from 3 years and 
2 months to 71 years. Coleoptera, Pselaphidoe, 2 species found in 3 
cases, interred from 16 years and 5 months to 28 years. Staphylini- 
dae, Homalota, found in 4 cases, interred from 1 year and 11 months 
to 10 years; Staphylinns found in 1 case, interred 15 years and 5 
months ; Philonthus found in one case, interred 5 years and 4 months ; 
Actobius found in 22 cases, interred from 3 years and 2 months to 10 
years; Latlirobium found in 3 cases, interred from 4 years and 4 
months to 9 years and 9 months; Pcederus found in 1 case, interred 
3 years and 2 months ; Eleusis found in 56 cases, interred from 1 year 
and 11 months to 11 years and 2 months. Nitidulidse, Rhizophagus 
found in 10 cases, interred from 1 year and 11 months to 28 years. 
Diptera, Phoridse, puparia found in 43 cases, interred from 3 years and 
2 months to 38 years; Muscidae, 2 species found in 5 cases, interred from 
3 days to 4 years and 1 month ; Anthomyidse, Homalomyia found in one 
case, interred 2 years and 11 months; Sepsidae, Piophila found in 13 
cases, interred from 3 years and 2 months to 10 years and 3 months. 
Since the completion of this paper, the writer has received a re¬ 
print of Johnston & Villeneuve’s paper, “On the Medico-Legal Ap¬ 
plication of Entomology,” which was “ read before the Canadian 
Medical Association, Montreal, August, 1896,” and published in the 
Montreal Medical Journal, August, 1897. These authors assert that 
“ one may now judge from the animal fauna met with in a dead body 
how long it has been exposed.” But they add: “The chief danger 
to be feared from Megnin’s imitators is that they might tend to indulge 
