ON A RECENT SPECULATION AS TO RANK IN INSECTA

Extract

The reader will have noticed, in the June number of the Canadian Entomologist, a paper on the “Physiological Arrangement of Insects.” The author there places the Orthoptera first in this list, owing to the presence of auditory organs and well developed eyes. The “arrangement” which follows is exceedingly “mixed,” but the object of the present remarks is to point out that the author mistakes when he considers the presence of sense-organs as the crucial test of rank. And for this reason, that, within the different Sub-orders, there is great variation in this respect. For instance, in the Pyralidœ we have forms almost identical, such as Chryseudenton and Cataclysta, which differ by the absence or presence of simple eyes. I do not wish to follow out the argument at length; the environment seems to effect comparatively easily the sense organs; Cave-insects are frequently blind.