THE 
NATURAL HISTORY REVIEW, 
Untersuchungen ueber die Fluegel-typen der Coleopteren, von Prof. 
Dr. H. Burmeister. (Part I. Clavicornia, with a plate.) 4to. Halle. 
1855. 
Wings may be considered characteristic of insects among the Annulata, no 
less than of birds among the Vertebrata, although this character be neither 
strictly universal in the former, nor exclusively confined to the latter class. 
The earliest arrangement of the Annulata which has come down to us— 
that of Aristotle—is based upon these organs; and they have continued 
to hold either the first, or a nearly co-ordinate place, in most of the modern 
systems of Entomology, the differences in their number and texture chiefly 
being regarded in the characters of the orders. Frisch* was the first who 
looked for generic distinctions in the disposition of the horny veins which, 
acted on by muscles contained in the thorax, move the membrane, kept by 
them in a state of tension. Moses Harris next applied the principle to the 
classification of the Diptera, and a part of the Hymenoptera, which he 
illustrated by numerous and accurate figures.f After him, Jurine more, 
fully and methodically elaborated the genera of Hymenoptera on like 
grounds, adding a scheme of nomenclature for the veins, the basis of that 
now in common use.| The great significance of the characters thence 
derived is now universally admitted, as regards these two orders, which 
combine evidence, precision, simplicity, and variety in the venation. But 
in the remaining orders, where one or other of these conditions for the 
most part undergoes a degradation, the use of such a help for classification 
was more tardy, or remains yet incomplete. This has been the case more 
* Beschreibungen von all. Insekten u. s. w. Berlin. 1720. 
f Exposition of English Insects. London. 1776. 
X Nouvelle Methode de classer les Hymenoptferes, etc. Geneve. 1807. 
VOL. III. B 
