Читать книгу A Text-book of Entomology - A. S. Packard - Страница 50

Marey’s views on the flight of insects.—As we owe more to Marey than to any one else for what exact knowledge we have of the theory of flight of insects, the following account is condensed from his work entitled “Movement.” The exceedingly complicated movements of the wings would lead us, he says, to suppose that there exists in insects a very complex set of muscles of flight, but in reality, he claims, there are only the two elevator and depressor muscles of each wing.^[34] And Marey says that when we examine more closely the mechanical conditions of the flight of insects, we see that an upward and downward motion given by the muscles is sufficient to produce all these successive acts, so well coordinated with each other; the resistance of the air effecting all the other movements. He also refers to the experiments of Giraud which prove that the insect needs for flight a rigid main-rib and a flexible membrane.