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Nicolet, the naturalist who, previous to Lubbock, has given us the most correct and complete account of the Thysanura, regarded them as an order, equivalent to the Coleoptera or Diptera, for example. In this he followed Latreille, who established the order in 1796. The Abbé Bourlet adopted the same view.

I fancy these bloodthirsty diptera guard the Brazilian frontier considerably better than the poverty-stricken soldiers we see on the bank." "But if everything is of use in nature," asked Minha, "what is the use of mosquitoes?" "They minister to the happiness of entomologists," replied Manoel; "and I should be much embarrassed to find a better explanation."

Thus the Bembex, which especially attacks Diptera to make them the prey of its larvæ, throws itself suddenly on them and kills them with one blow in any part of the body. It is unable in this way to amass in advance sufficient provision for its larvæ; the corpses would putrefy. It is obliged to return from time to time bearing new pasture.

In "that hideous lout" the Scorpion he shows us a rough epitome of the shapeless head, the truncated face of the spider. The Tachinae, those "brazen diptera" which swarm on the sunny sand on the watch for Bembex or Philanthus, in order to establish their offspring at its expense, "are bandits clad in fustian, the head wrapped in a red handkerchief, awaiting the hour of attack!"

Even this perfectly gradual transition from the youngest larva to the sexually mature Insect, preserves in a far higher degree the picture of an original mode of development, than does the so-called complete metamorphosis of the Coleoptera, Lepidoptera, or Diptera, with its abruptly separated larva-, pupa- and imago-states.

In one of the species, they equal the whole body in length. They might be thought to be adapted for fighting, but as in one species they are of a beautiful pink colour, edged with black, with a pale central stripe, and as these insects have altogether a very elegant appearance, it is perhaps more probable that they serve as ornaments. That the males of some Diptera fight together is certain; Prof.

The stages of metamorphosis in the Diptera are no more suddenly acquired than in the bee or butterfly. In all these insects the rudiments of the wings, legs, and even of the ovipositor of the adult exist in the young larva. We have found somewhat similar intermediate stages in the metamorphoses of the beetles. The insects we have mentioned are those with a "complete metamorphosis."

Only one group remained unaffected by the intense drought; the Diptera, or two-winged flies, continued as plentifully as ever, and on these I was almost compelled to concentrate my attention for a week or two, by which means I increased my collection of that Order to about two hundred species.

We are in March. My prisoners bestir themselves, change their skin. They need victuals. My catering difficulties recommence. The House-fly, so easy to catch, is lacking in these days. I fall back upon earlier Diptera: Eristales, or Drone-flies. The Empusa refuses them. They are too big for her and can offer too strenuous a resistance. She wards off their approach with blows of her mitre.

The present volume contains all the essays on flies, or Diptera, from the Souvenirs entomologiques, to which I have added, in order to make the dimensions uniform with those of the other volumes of the series, the purely autobiographical essays comprised in the Souvenirs.