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Pair of swimming feet with their broad basal joints, whose serrated edges serve the office of maxillae. h. Thoracic plate covering the first two thoracic segments, which are indicated by the figures 1, 2, and a dotted line. 1-6. Thoracic segments. 7-12. Abdominal segments. 13.
A small mouth, by means of small maxillae, is very essential, as it is the specific characteristic of the human face as distinguished from the muzzle of the brutes. A receding, as it were, a cut-away chin is particularly repellent, because mentum prominulum is a characteristic belonging exclusively to our species.
We see the same great law in the construction of the mouths of insects: what can be more different than the immensely long spiral proboscis of a sphinx-moth, the curious folded one of a bee or bug, and the great jaws of a beetle? yet all these organs, serving for such different purposes, are formed by infinitely numerous modifications of an upper lip, mandibles, and two pairs of maxillae.
On its first arrival it appeared very thirsty, and with exserted maxillae drank eagerly of drops of water, this same circumstance has been observed by Strack: may it not be in consequence of the little insect having passed through a dry and rarefied atmosphere? Its stock of web seemed inexhaustible.
All the parts of the mouth are extremely minute; the palpi and exterior maxillae have almost disappeared; the cirri are thick, inarticulate, and destitute of bristles; and the muscles both of the mouth and cirri are without transverse striation. Darwin found the stomach perfectly empty in the animal examined by him.
Yet all these organs, serving for such widely different purposes, are formed by infinitely numerous modifications of an upper lip, mandibles, and two pairs of maxillae. The same law governs the construction of the mouths and limbs of crustaceans. So it is with the flowers of plants.
So with the mouths of insects, we have only to suppose that their common progenitor had an upper lip, mandibles, and two pair of maxillae, these parts being perhaps very simple in form; and then natural selection will account for the infinite diversity in structure and function of the mouths of insects.
For how otherwise came axilla to be changed into ala, but by the omission of an unweildy consonant, which the elegant pronunciation of our language has likewise banished from the words maxillae, taxillae, vexillum, and paxillum?
So with the mouths of insects, we have only to suppose that their common progenitor had an upper lip, mandibles, and two pairs of maxillae, these parts being perhaps very simple in form; and then natural selection will account for the infinite diversity in structure and function of the mouths of insects.
On its first arrival it appeared very thirsty, and with exserted maxillae drank eagerly of drops of water; this same circumstance has been observed by Strack: may it not be in consequence of the little insect having passed through a dry and rarefied atmosphere? Its stock of web seemed inexhaustible.
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