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The insects by general consent stand at the head of the Arthropoda. Their bodies are quite as much complicated or specialized, and indeed, when we consider the winged forms, more so, than any other class of the branch, and besides this they have wings, fitting them for an aërial life. It is with little doubt that to their power of flight, and thus of escaping the attacks of their creeping arthropod enemies, insects owe, so to speak, their success in life; i.e. their numerical superiority in individuals, species, and genera. It is also apparently their power of moving or swimming swiftly from one place to another which has led to the numerical superiority in species of fishes to other Vertebrata. Among terrestrial vertebrates, the birds, by virtue of their ability to fly, greatly surpass in number of species the reptiles and mammals.

The Arthropoda are in general characterized by having the body composed of segments (somites or arthromeres) bearing jointed appendages. They differ from the worms in having segmented appendages, i.e. antennæ, jaws, and legs, instead of the soft unjointed outgrowths of the annelid worms. Moreover, their bodies are composed of a more or less definite number of segments or rings, grouped either into a head-thorax (cephalothorax) and hind-body, as in Crustacea, or into a head differentiated from the rest of the body (trunk), the latter not being divided into a distinct thorax and abdomen, as in Myriopoda; or into three usually quite distinct regions—the head, thorax, and hind-body or abdomen, as in insects. In certain aberrant, modified forms, as the Tardigrada, or the Pantopoda, and the mites, the body is not differentiated into such definite regions.

In their internal organs arthropods agree in their general relations with the higher worms, hence most zoölogists agree that they have directly originated from the annelid worms.

The position and general shape of the digestive canal, of the nervous and circulatory systems, are the same in Arthropoda as in annelid (oligochete) worms, so much so that it is generally thought that the Arthropoda are the direct descendants of the worms. It is becoming evident, however, that there was no common ancestor of the Arthropoda as a whole, and that the group is a polyphyletic one. Hence, though a convenient group, it is a somewhat artificial one, and may eventually be dismembered into at least three or four phyla or branches.

The following diagram may serve to show in a tentative way the relations of the classes of Arthropoda to each other, and also may be regarded as a provisional genealogical tree of the branch.

We will now rapidly review the leading features of the classes of Arthropoda.

The Crustacea.—These Arthropoda are in many most important characteristics unlike the insects; they have two pairs of antennæ, five pairs of buccal appendages, and they are branchiate Arthropoda. They have evidently originated entirely independently, and by a direct line of descent from some unknown annelid ancestor which was either a many-segmented worm, with parapodia, or the two groups together with the Rotifera may have originated from a common appendigerous Trochosphæra. Their segments in the higher forms are definite in number (23 or 24) and arranged into two regions, a head-thorax (cephalothorax) and hind-body (abdomen). Nearly all the segments, both of the cephalothorax and abdomen, bear a pair of jointed limbs, and to them at their base are, in the higher forms, appended the gills (branchiæ). The limbs are in the more specialized forms (shrimps and crabs) differentiated into eye-stalks, two pairs of antennæ, a pair of palpus-bearing jaws (mandibles), two pairs of maxillæ and three pairs of maxillipeds; these appendages being biramose, and the latter bearing gills attached to their basal joints. The legs are further differentiated into ambulatory thoracic legs and into swimming or abdominal legs, and in the latter the first pair of the male is modified into copulatory organs (gonopoda). The male and female reproductive organs as a rule are in separate individuals, hermaphrodites being very unusual, and the glands may be paired or single. The sexual outlets are generally paired, and, as in the male lobster and other Macrura, open in the basal joint of the last pair of legs, and in the female in the third from the last; while originally in all Crustacea the sexual organs were most probably paired (Fig. 3, B).

They are, except a few land Isopoda, aquatic, mostly marine, and when they have a metamorphosis, pass through a six-legged larval stage, called the Nauplius, the shrimps and crabs passing through an additional stage, the Zoëa. Crustacea also differ much from insects in the highly modified nature of the nephridia, which are usually represented by the green gland of the lobster, or the shell-glands of the Phyllopoda, which open out in one of the head-segments; also in the possession of a pair of large digestive glands, the so-called liver.

Intermediate in some respects between the Crustacea and insects, but more primitive, in respect to what are perhaps the most weighty characters, than the Crustacea, are the Trilobita, the Merostomata (Limulus), and, finally, the Arachnida, these being allied groups. In the Trilobita and Merostomata (Limulus), the head-appendages are more like feet than jaws, while they have in most respects a similar mode of embryonic development, the larval forms being also similar.

Fig. 1.—Restoration of under side of a trilobite (Triarthrus becki), the trunk limbs bearing small triangular respiratory lobes or gills.—After Beecher.

The Merostomata.—The only living form, Limulus, is undoubtedly a very primitive type, as the genital glands and ducts are double, opening wide apart on the basal pair of abdominal legs (Fig. 3). Moreover, their head-appendages, which are single, with spines on the basal joint, are very primitive and morphologically nearer in shape to those of the worms (Syllidæ, etc.) than even those of the Crustacea. Besides, their four pairs of coxal glands, with an external opening at the base of the fifth pair of head-appendages, and which probably are modified nephridia (Crustacea having but a single pair in any one form, either opening out on the second antennal, green gland, or second maxillary, shell-gland, segment), indicate a closer approximation to the polynephrous worms. Limulus has other archaic features, especially as regards the structure of the simple and compound eyes and the simple nature of the brain.

The Trilobita.—These archaic forms are still more generalized and primitive than the Merostomata and Crustacea, and probably were the first Arthropoda to be evolved from some unknown annelid worm. They had jointed biramose limbs of nearly uniform shape and size on each segment of the body, which were not, as in Crustacea, differentiated into antennæ, jaws (mandibles), maxillæ, maxillipeds, and two kinds of legs (thoracic and abdominal), showing that they are a much more primitive type, and nearer to the annelids than any other Arthropoda. Their gills, as shown by the researches of Walcott and of Beecher, were attached to nearly if not every pair of limbs behind the antennæ (Figs. 1, 2). The fact that in Trilobita the first pair of limbs is antenniform does not prove that they are Crustacea, since Eurypterus has a similar pair of appendages.

Fig. 2.—Restored section of Calymene: C, carapace; en, endopodite; en′, exopodite; with the gills on the epipodal or respiratory part of the appendage.—After Walcott.

The limbs in trilobites, as well as the abdominal ones of merostomes, and all those of Crustacea, except the first antennæ, are biramose, consisting of an outer (exopodite) and an inner division (endopodite). In this respect the terrestrial air-breathing tracheate forms, Arachnida, Myriopoda, and Insecta, differ from the branchiate forms, as their legs are single or undivided, being adapted for supporting the body during locomotion upon the solid earth. It is to be observed that when, as in Limulus, the body is supported by cephalic ambulatory limbs, they are single, while the abdominal limbs, used as they are in swimming, are biramose, much as in Crustacea.

The Arachnida.—The scorpions and spiders are much less closely allied to the myriopods and insects than formerly supposed. Their embryology shows that they have descended from forms related to Limulus, possibly having had an origin in common with that animal, or having, as some authors claim, directly diverged from some primitive eurypteroid merostome. But they differ in essential respects, and not only in the nature and grouping of their appendages; the first pair instead of antenniform being like mandibles, and the second pair like the maxillæ, with the palps, of insects, the four succeeding segments (thoracic) bearing each a pair of legs. They also have a brain quite unlike that of Limulus, the nervous cord behind the brain, however, being somewhat similar, though that of Limulus differs in being enveloped by an arterial coat. Arachnida respire by tracheæ, besides book-lungs, which, however, are possibly derivatives of the book-gills of Limulus, while they perform the office of excretion by means of the malpighian tubes, and like Limulus possess two large digestive glands (“liver”). Their embryos have, on at least six abdominal segments, rudiments of limbs, three pairs of which form the spinnerets, showing their origin from Limulus-like or eurypteroid forms; their coxal glands are retained from their eurypteroid ancestors. The Arachnida probably descended from marine merostomes, and not from an independent annelid ancestry, hence we have represented them in the diagram on p. 3 as branching off from the merostomatous phylum, rather than from an independent one.

Fig. 3.—Paired genital openings of different classes of arthropods. A, the most primitive, of Limulus polyphemus: gen. p, generative papillæ; d, duct; vd, vas deferens; t, tendinous stigmata; stig, stigmata; e, external branchial muscle; ant, anterior lamellar muscle.—After Benham, with a few changes. B, lobster (Homarus vulgaris), ♀: oe, genital aperture on 3d pair of legs; ov, ovary; u, unpaired portion of the same; od, oviduct. C, ♀, scorpion: ov, ovary, with a single external opening. D, ♂: t, testis; vd, vasa deferentia; sb, seminal vesicle; a, glandular appendage; p, penis.—After Blanchard. E, a myriopod (Glomeris marginata, ♀): os, ovarian sac, laid open; od, paired oviducts. F, ♂: t, testis; gvd, common vas deferens; pa, paired ducts.—After Favre, from Lang. G, Lepisma saccharina, young ♂: vd, vas deferens, ed, ejaculatory duct; ga, external appendages.—After Nassonow. H, Ephemera, ♂, showing the double outlets.—After Palmén.

The characters in which arachnids approach insects, such as tracheæ and malpighian tubes (none occur, as a rule, in marine or branchiate arthropods), may be comparatively recent structures acquired during a change from a marine to a terrestrial life, and not primitive heirlooms.

Arachnida also show their later origin than merostomes by the fact that their sexual glands are in most cases single, and though with rare exceptions the ducts are paired, these finally unite and open externally by a common single genital aperture in the median line of the body, at the base of the abdomen (Fig. 3, C, D). In this respect Limulus, with its pair of genital male or female openings, situated each at the end of a papilla, placed widely apart at the base of the first abdominal limbs, is decidedly more archaic. Unlike Crustacea and insects, Arachnida do not, except in the mites (Acarina), which is a very much modified group, undergo a metamorphosis.

We see, then, that the insects, with the Myriopoda, are somewhat isolated from the other Arthropoda. The Myriopoda have a single pair of antennæ, and as they have other characters in common with insects, Lang has united the two groups in a single class Antennata; but, as we shall see, this seems somewhat premature and unnecessary. Yet the two groups have perhaps had a common parentage, and may prove to belong to a distinct, common phylum.

Not only by their structure and embryology, as well as their metamorphosis, do the myriopods and insects stand apart from the Arachnida and other arthropods, but it seems probable that they have had a different ancestry, the arthropods being apparently polyphyletic.

There are two animals which appear to connect the insects with the worms, and which indicate a separate line of descent from the worms independent of that of the other classes. These are the singular Peripatus, which serves as a connecting link between arthropods and worms, and Scolopendrella (Symphyla). These two animals are guide-posts, pointing out, though vaguely to be sure, the way probably trod by the forms, now extinct, which led up to the insects.

Relations of Peripatus to Insects.—We will first recount the characteristics of this monotypic class. Peripatus (Fig. 4) stands alone, with no forms intermediate between itself and the worms on the one hand, and the true Arthropoda on the other. Originally supposed to be a worm, it is now referred to a class by itself, the Malacopoda of Blainville, or Protracheata of Haeckel. It lives in the tropics, in damp places under decaying wood. In general appearance it somewhat resembles a caterpillar, but the head is soft and worm-like, though it bears a pair of antenna-like tentacles. It may be said rather to superficially resemble a leech with clawed legs, the skin and its wrinkles being like those of a leech. There is a pair of horny jaws in the mouth, but these are more like the pharyngeal teeth of worms than the jaws of arthropods. The numerous legs end each in a pair of claws. The ladder-like nervous system is unlike that of annelid worms or arthropods, but rather recalls that of certain molluscs (Chiton, etc.), as well as that of certain flat and nemertine worms. Its annelid features are the large number of segmentally arranged true nephridia, and the nature of the integument. Its arthropodan features, which appear to take it out of the group of worms, are the presence of tracheæ, of true salivary and slime glands, of a pair of coxal glands (Fig. 4, C, cd) as well as the claws at the end of the legs. The tracheæ, which are by no means the only arthropodan features, are evidently modified dermal glands. The heart is arthropodan, being a dorsal tube lying in a pericardial sinus, with many openings. This assemblage of characters is not to be found in any marine or terrestrial worm.

The tracheæ (Fig. 4, D, tr) are unbranched fine tubes, without a “spiral thread,” and are arranged in tufts, in P. edwardsii opening by simple orifices or pores (“stigmata”) scattered irregularly over the surface of the body; but in another species (P. capensis) some of the stigmata are arranged more definitely in longitudinal rows,—on each side two, one dorsally and one ventrally. “The stigmata in a longitudinal row are, however, more numerous than the pairs of legs.” (Lang.)

The salivary glands, opening by a short common duct into the under side of the mouth, in the same general position as in insects, are evidently, as the embryology of the animal proves, transformed nephridia, and being of the arthropodan type explain the origin and morphology of those of insects. It is so with the slime glands; these, with the coxal glands, being transformed and very large dermal glands. Those of insects arose in the same manner, and are evidently their homologues, while those of Peripatus were probably originally derived from the setiparous glands in the appendages (parapodia) of annelid worms.

Fig. 4.—A, Peripatus novæ zealandiæ.—After Sedgwick, from Lang. B, Peripatus capensis, side view, enlarged about twice the natural size.—After Moseley, from Balfour. C, Anatomy of Peripatus capensis. The enteric canal behind the pharynx has been removed. g, brain; a, antenna; op, oral or slime papillæ; sd, slime gland; sr, slime reservoir, which at the same time acts as a duct to the gland; so4, so5, so6, so9, nephridia of the 4th, 5th, 6th, and 9th pairs of limbs; cd, elongated coxal gland of the last pair of feet; go, genital aperture; an, anus; ph, pharynx; n, longitudinal trunk of the nervous system.—After Balfour, from Lang. D, Portion of the body of Peripatus capensis opened to show the scattered tufts of tracheæ (tr); v, v, ventral nerve cords.—After Moseley.

The genital glands and ducts are paired, but it is to be observed that the outlets are single and situated at the end of the body. In the male the ejaculatory duct is single; in its base a spermatophore is formed. It will be seen, then, that Peripatus is not only a composite type, and a connecting link between worms and tracheate arthropods, but that it may reasonably be regarded, if not itself the ancestor, as resembling the probable progenitor of myriopods and insects, though of course there is a very wide gap between Peripatus and the other antennate, air-breathing Arthropoda.

Fig. 4.—E, Peripatus edwardsii, head from the under side: a, base of antenna; op, oral papilla; the figure also shows the papillæ around the mouth, and the four jaws.—After Balfour, from Lang. F, Anterior end of Peripatus capensis, ventral side, laid open: a, antenna; z, tongue; k, jaw; sd, salivary gland; gs, union of the two salivary glands; ph, pharynx; œ, œsophagus; l, lip papillæ around the mouth; op, oral or slime papilla; sld, duct or reservoir of the slime gland.—After Balfour, from Lang.

Relation of Myriopods to Insects.—The Myriopoda are the nearest allies of the insects. They have a distinct head, with one pair of antennæ. The eyes are simple, with the exception of a single genus (Cermatia), in which they are aggregated or compound. The trunk or body behind the head is, as a rule, long and slender, and composed of a large but variable number of segments, of equal size and shape, bearing jointed legs, which invariably end in a single claw.

The mouth-parts of the myriopods are so different in shape and general function from those of insects, that this character, together with the equally segmented nature of the portion of the body behind the head (the trunk), forbids our merging them, as some have been inclined to do, with the insects. There are two sub-classes of myriopods, differing in such important respects that by Pocock^[1] and by Kingsley they are regarded as independent classes, each equivalent to the insects.

Of these the most primitive are the Diplopoda (Chilognatha), represented by the galley-worms (Julus, etc.).

Fig. 5.—Mandible of Julus: l, lacinia; g, galea; p, dens mandibularis; ma, “mala”; lt, lamina tritoria; st, stipes; c, cardo; m, muscle.—After Latzel.

In the typical Diplopoda the head consists of three segments, a preoral or antennal, and two postoral, there being two pairs of jaw-like appendages, which, though in a broad morphological sense homologues of the mandibles and first maxillæ of insects, are quite unlike them in details.

Fig. 6.—Under lip or deutomala of Scoterpes copei: hyp, hypostoma or mentum; lam. lab, lamina labialis; stip. e, stipes exterior; with the malella exterior (mal. e) and malella interior (mal. i); the stipes interior, with the malulella; and the labiella (hypopharynx of Vom Rath) with its stilus (stil.).

As we have previously stated,^[2] the so-called “mandibles” of diplopods are entirely different from those of insects, since they appear to be 2– or 3–jointed, the terminal joint being 2–lobed, thus resembling the maxillæ rather than the mandibles of insects, which consist of but a single piece or joint, probably the homologue of the galea or molar joint of the diplopod protomala. The mandible of the Julidæ (Fig. 5, Julus molybdinus), Lysiopetalidæ, and Polydesmidæ consists of three joints; viz. a basal piece or cardo, a stipes, and the mala mandibularis, which supports two lobes analogous to the galea and lacinia of the maxilla of an insect. There is an approach, as we shall see, in the mandible of Copris, to that of the Julidæ, but in insects in general the lacinia is wanting, and the jaw consists of but a single piece.

The deutomalæ (gnathochilarium), or second pair of diplopod jaws, are analogous to the labium or second maxillæ of insects, forming a flattened, plate-like under-lip, constituting the floor of the mouth (Fig. 6). This pair of appendages needs farther study, especially in the late embryo, before it can be fully understood. So far as known, judging by Metschnikoff’s work on the embryology of the diplopods, these myriopods seem to have in the embryo but two pairs of post-antennal mouth-parts, which he designated as the “mandibles” and “labium.” Meinert, however, regards as a third pair of mouth-parts or “labium” what in our Fig. 7 is called the internal stipes (stip. i.), behind which is a triangular plate, lamina labialis (lam. lab), which he regards as the sternite of the same segment.

Fig. 7.—Deutomala of Julus, the lettering as in Fig. 6.

Fig. 8.—Head of Scolopendra, seen from beneath, showing the “mandible” (protomala) with its cardo (card.) and stipes (st.), also the labrum and epilabrum.

The hypopharynx, our “labiella,” (Fig. 6), with the supporting rods or stili linguales (sti. l), of Meinert, are of nearly the same shape as in some insects.

Of the clypeus of insects there is apparently no homologue in myriopods, though in certain diplopods there is an interantennal clypeal region. The labium of insects is represented by a short, broad piece, which, however, unlike that of insects, is immovable, and is flanked by a separate piece called the epilabrum (Fig. 8). Vom Rath has observed an epipharynx, which has the same general relations as in insects.

Fig. 9.—Larva of Julus: a, the 3d abdominal segment, with the new limbs just budding out; b, new segments arising between the penultimate and the last segment.—After Newport.

The embryology of myriopods is in many respects like that of insects. The larva of diplopods hatches with but few segments, and with but three pairs of limbs; but these are not, as in insects, appended to consecutive segments, but in one species the third, and in another, Julus multistriatus? (Fig. 10), the second, segment from the head is footless, while Vom Rath represents the first segment of an European Blaniulus as footless, the feet being situated consecutively on segments 2 to 4. The new segments arise at “the growing point” situated between the last and penultimate segment, growing out in groups of sixes (Newport) or in our Julus multistriatus? in fives (Fig. 10). In adult life diplopods (Julus) have a single pair of limbs on the three first segments, or those corresponding to the thoracic segments of insects, the succeeding segments having two pairs to each segment.

Fig. 10.—Freshly hatched larva of Julus multistriatus? 3 mm. long: a, 5 pairs of rudimentary legs, one pair to a segment.

Sinclair (Heathcote) regards each double segment in the diplopods as not two original segments fused together, nor a single segment bearing two pairs of legs, but as “two complete segments perfect in all particulars, but united by a large dorsal plate which was originally two plates which have been fused together.” (Myriopods, 1895, p. 71.) That the segments were primitively separate is shown, he adds, by the double nature of the circulatory system, the nerve cord, and the first traces of segmentation in the mesoblast. Kenyon believes that from the conditions in pauropods, Lithobius, etc., there are indications of alternate plates (not segments) having disappeared, and of the remaining plates overgrowing the segments behind them, so as to give rise to the anomalous double segments.^[3]

Fig. 11.—Sixth pair of legs of Polyzonium germanicum, ♀: cs, ventral sacs; cox, coxa; st, sternal plate; sp, spiracle.—After Haase.

Diplopods are also provided with eversible coxal sacs, in position like those of Symphyla and Synaptera; Meinert, Latzel, and also Haase having detected them in several species of Chordeumidæ, Lysiopetalidæ, and Polyzonidæ (Fig. 11). In Lysiopetalum anceps these blood-gills occur in both sexes between the coxæ of the third to sixteenth pair of limbs. In the Diplopods the blood-gills appear to be more or less permanently everted, while in Scolopendrella they are usually retracted within the body (Fig. 15, cg).

Diplopods also differ externally from insects in the genital armature, a complicated apparatus of male claspers and hooks apparently arising from the sternum of the sixth segment and being the modified seventh pair of legs. In myriopods there are no pleural pieces or “pleurites,” so characteristic of winged insects.

Perhaps the most fundamental difference between diplopods and insects is the fact that the paired genital openings of the former are situated not far behind the head between the second and third pair of legs. Both the oviducts and male ejaculatory ducts are paired, with separate openings. The genital glands lie beneath, while in chilopods they lie above the intestine; this, as Korschelt and Heider state, being a more primitive relation, since in Peripatus they also lie above the digestive canal.

The nervous system of diplopods is not only remarkable for the lack of the tendency towards a fusion of the ganglia observable in insects, but for the fact that the double segments are each provided with two ganglia. The brain also is very small in proportion to the ventral cord, the nervous system being in its general appearance somewhat as in caterpillars.

The arrangement of the tracheæ and stigmata is much as in insects, but in the Diplopoda the tracheary system is more primitive than in chilopods, a pair of stigmata and a pair of tracheal bundles occurring in each segment, while the bundles are not connected by anastomosing branches, branched tracheæ only occurring in the Glomeridæ. The tracheæ themselves are without spiral threads (tænidia). It is noteworthy that the tracheæ arise much later than in insects, not appearing until the animal is hatched; in this respect the myriopods approximate Peripatus.

In the Chilopoda also the parts of the head, except the epicranium, are not homologous with those of insects, neither are the mouth-parts, of which there are five pairs.

The structure of the head of centipedes is shown in part in Fig. 12, compare also Fig. 8. It will be seen that it differs much from that of the diplopods, though the mandibles (protomalæ) are homologous; they are divided into a cardo and stipes, thus being at least two-jointed.

The second pair of postoral appendages is in centipedes very different from the gnathochilarium of diplopods. As seen in Fig. 12 2, they are separate, cylindrical, fleshy, five-jointed appendages, the maxillary appendages of Newport, which are “connected transversely at their base with a pair of soft appendages” (c), the lingua of Newport. The third and fourth pair are foot-jaws, and we have called them malipedes, as they have of course no homology with the maxillipedes of Crustacea. The second pair of these malipedes, forming the last pair of mouth-appendages, is the poison-fangs (4), which are intermediate between the malipedes and the feet; Meinert does not allow that these are mouth-appendages.

Fig. 12.—Structure of a chilopod. A, Lithobius americanus, natural size. B, under side of head and first two body-segments and legs, enlarged: ant, antenna; 1, jaws; 2, first accessory jaw; c, lingua; 3, second accessory jaw and palpus; 4, poison-jaw. (Kingsley del.) C, side view of head (after Newport): ep, epicranium; l, frontal plate; sc, scute; 1, first leg; sp, spiracle.

The embryology of Geophilus by Metschnikoff shows plainly the four pairs of post-antennal appendages. The embryo Geophilus is hatched in the form of the adult, having, unlike the diplopods, no metamorphosis, its embryological history being condensed or abbreviated. But in examining Metschnikoff’s figures certain primitive diplopod features are revealed. The body of the embryo shortly before hatching is cylindrical; the sternal region is much narrower than in the adult, hence the insertions of the feet are nearer together, while the first six pairs of appendages begin to grow out before the hinder ones. Thus the first six pairs of appendages of the embryo Geophilus correspond to the antennæ, two pairs of jaws, and three pairs of legs of the larval Julus. These features appear to indicate that the chilopods may be an offshoot from the diplopod stem. The acquisition of a second pair of legs to a segment in diplopods, as in the phyllopod Crustacea, is clearly enough a secondary character, as shown by the figures of Newport in his memoir on the development of the Myriopoda (Pl. IV.). Thus the tendency in the Myriopoda, both diplopods and chilopods, is towards the multiplication of segments and the elongation of the body, while in insects the polypodous embryo has the three terminal segments of the abdomen well formed, these being, however, before hatching, partly atrophied, so that the body of insects after birth tends to become shortened or condensed. This indicates the descent of insects from ancestors with elongated polypodous hind-bodies like Scolopendrella. Korschelt and Heider suggest that the stem-form of myriopods was a homonomously jointed form like Peripatus, consisting of a rather large number of segments, but we might, with Haase, consider that the great number of segments which we now find indicates a late acquisition of this form.

The genital opening in chilopods is single, and situated in the penultimate segment of the body, as in insects. While recognizing the close relationship of the Myriopoda with the insects, it still seems advisable not to unite them into a single group (as Oudemans, Lang, and others would do), but to regard them as forming an equivalent class. On the other hand, when we take into account the form and structure of the head, antennæ, and especially the shape of the first pair of mouth-appendages, being at least two-jointed in both groups, we think these characters, with the homonomously segmented body behind the head, outweigh the difference in the position of the genital outlet, important as that may seem. It should also be taken into account that while insects are derived from polypodous ancestors, no one supposes, with the exception of one or two authors, that these ancestors are the Myriopoda, the latter having evidently descended from a six-legged ancestor, quite different from that of the Campodea ancestor of insects.^[4]

In regard to the sexual openings of worms, though their position is in general in the anterior part of the body, it is still very variable, though, in general, paired. In the oligochete worms the genital zone, with the external openings, is formed by the segments lying between the 9th and 14th rings, though in some the genital organs are situated still nearer the head. The myriopods, which evolved from the worms earlier than insects, appear to have in their most primitive forms (the Diplopoda) retained this vermian position of the genital outlets. In the later forms, the chilopods, the genital openings have been carried back to near the end of the body, as in insects. From observations made by three different observers on the freshly hatched larva of the Julidæ, it appears that the ancestral diplopods were six-footed, or oligopod, the larva of Pauropus (Fig. 13) approaching nearest to our idea of the ancestral myriopod, which might provisionally be named Protopauropus.

Relations of the Symphyla to Insects.—Opinions respecting the position of the Symphyla, represented by Scolopendrella (Fig. 14), are very discordant. By most writers since Newport, Scolopendrella has been placed among the myriopods. The first author, however, to examine its internal anatomy was Menge (1851), who discovered among other structures (tracheæ, etc.) the silk-glands situated in the last two segments, and which open at the end of each cercus. He regarded the form as “the type of a genus or family intermediate between the hexapod Lepismidæ and the Scolopendridæ.”

Fig. 13.—Pauropus huxleyi, much enlarged. A, enlarged view of head, antennæ, and first pair of legs (original). B, young.—After Lubbock. C, longitudinal section of Pauropus huxleyi, ♂: a, brain; b, salivary gland; k, mid-intestine; g, rectum; h, ventral nerve-cord; c, bud-like remnants of coxæ; d, penis; e, vesicula seminalis; f, ductus glandularis; i¹, divisions of testes.—After Kenyon.

In 1873^[5] the writer referred to this form as follows: “It may be regarded as a connecting link between the Thysanura and Myriopoda, and shows the intimate relation of the myriopods and the hexapods, perhaps not sufficiently appreciated by many zoölogists.”

In 1880 Ryder regarded it as “the last survival of the form from which insects may be supposed to have descended,” and referred it to “the new ordinal group Symphyla, in reference to the singular combination of myriopodous, insectean, and thysanurous characters which it presents.^[6]”

Fig. 14.—Scolopendrella immaculata, from above,—after Lang; also from beneath, the genital opening on the 4th trunk-segment: sac, eversible or coxal sac; an, anus; c, cereopod; v, vestigial leg.—After Haase, from Peytoureau. A B C, head and buccal appendages of Scolopendrella immaculata: A, head seen from above; cl, clypeus. B, head from beneath; l, first pair of legs; mx, 1st maxilla; mx¹, 2d maxilla; t, “labial plates” of Latzel, labium of Muhr. C, 1st maxilla; l, lacinia; g, galea; p, rudiment of the palpus.—After Latzel. D, end of the body: p₁₁, eleventh, p₁₂, twelfth undeveloped pair of legs; p₁₃, modified, vestigial legs, bearing tactile organs (so); sg, cercopod, with duct of spinning gland, dg; cd, eversible or coxal gland; h8s, coxal spur of the 11th pair of legs.—After Latzel from Lang.

Wood-Mason considered it to be a myriopod, and “the descendant of a group of myriopods from which the Campodeæ, Thysanura, and Collembola may have sprung.” We are indebted to Grassi for the first extended work on the morphology of Scolopendrella (1885). In 1886 he added to our knowledge facts regarding the internal anatomy, and gives a detailed comparison with the Thysanura, besides pointing out the resemblances of Scolopendrella to Pauropus, diplopods, chilopods, as well as Peripatus.

Fig. 15.—Section of Scolopendrella immaculata: œ, œsophagus; oe. v, œsophageal valve entering the mid-intestine (“stomach”); i, intestine; r, rectum; br, brain; ns, abdominal chain of ganglia; ovd, oviduct; ov, ovary; s. gl, silk-gland, and op, its outer opening in cercus, ur. t, urinary tube; cg, coxal glands or blood-gills.—Author del.

In 1888 Grassi expressed his view as to the position of the Symphyla, stating that it should not be included in the Thysanura, since it evidently has myriopod characters; these being the supraspinal vessel, the ventral position of the genital glands; the situation of the genital opening in the fourth segment of the trunk, its ganglionic chain being like that of diplopods, its having limbs on all the segments, etc. On the other hand, Grassi has with much detail indicated the points of resemblance to the Thysanura. The principal ones are the thin integument, the want of sympathetic ganglia, the presence of a pair of cephalic stigmata, like that said to occur in certain Collembola, and in the embryo of Apis; two endoskeletal processes situated near the ventral fascia of the head; the epicranial suture also occurring in Thysanura, Collembola, Orthoptera, and other winged insects, and being absent in diplopods and chilopods. He also adds that the digestive canal both in Symphyla and Thysanura is divided into three portions; the malpighian tubes in Thysanura present very different conditions (there being none in Japyx), among which may be comprised those of Scolopendrella. In both groups there is a single pair of salivary glands. The cellular epithelium of the mid-intestine of Scolopendrella is of a single form as in Campodea and Japyx. The fat-body, dorsal vessel, with its valves and ostia, are alike in the two groups, as are the appendages of the end of the abdomen, the anal cerci (cercopoda) of Scolopendrella being the homologues of the multiarticulate appendages of Lepisma, etc., and of the forceps of Japyx. In those of Scolopendrella, we have found the large duct leading from the voluminous silk-gland, a single large sac extending forwards into the third segment from the end of the body (Fig. 15, s. gl). Other points of resemblance, all of which he enumerates, are the slight differences in the number of trunk-segments, the presence in the two groups of the abdominal “false-legs” (parapodia), the dorsal plate, and the mouth-parts. As regards the latter, Grassi affirms that there is a perfect parallelism between those of Scolopendrella and Thysanura. To this point we will return again in treating more especially of those of the Symphyla. Finally, Grassi concludes that there is “a great resemblance between the Thysanura and Scolopendrella.” He, however, believed that the Symphyla are the forerunners of the myriopods, and not of the insects, his genealogical tree representing the symphylan and thysanuran phyla as originating from the same point, this point also being, rather strangely, the point of origin of the arachnidan phylum.

Haase (1889) regarded Scolopendrella as a myriopod, and Pocock (1893) assigned the Symphyla to an independent class, regarding Scolopendrella as “the living form that comes nearest to the hypothetical ancestor of the two great divisions of tracheates.” Schmidt’s work (1895) on the morphology of this genus is more extended and richly illustrated than Grassi’s, his method of research being more modern. He also regards this form as one of the lower myriopods.

In conclusion, it appears to us that, on the whole, if we throw out the single characteristic of the anteriorly situated genital opening, the ovarian tubes being directed toward the end of the body (Fig. 15, ovd, ov), there is not sufficient reason for placing the Symphyla among the Myriopoda, either below or near the diplopods. This is the only valid reason for not regarding Scolopendrella as the representative of a group from which the insects have descended, and which partly fills the wide abyss between Peripatus and insects. With the view of Pocock, that both insects and myriopods have descended from Scolopendrella, we do not agree, because this form has so many insectean features, and a single unpaired genital opening. For the same reason we should not agree with Schmidt in interpolating the Symphyla between the Pauropoda and Diplopoda. In these last two progoneate groups the genital openings are paired, hence they are much more primitive types than Scolopendrella, in which there is but a single opening. It seems most probable that the Symphyla, though progoneate, are more recent forms than the progoneate myriopods, which have retained the primitive feature of double sexual outlets. It is more probable that the Symphyla were the descendants of these polypodous forms. Certainly Scolopendrella is the only extant arthropod which, with the sole exception of the anteriorly situated genital opening, fulfils the conditions required of an ancestor of Thysanura, and through them of the winged insects. No one has been so bold as to suggest the derivation of insects from either diplopods or chilopods, while their origin from a form similar to Scolopendrella seems not improbable. Yet Uzel has very recently discovered that Campodea develops in some respects like Geophilus, the primitive band sinking in its middle into the yolk, with other features as in chilopods.^[7] The retention of a double sexual opening in the diplopods is paralleled by the case of Limulus with its double or paired sexual outlets, opening in a pair of papillæ, as compared with what are regarded as the generalized or more primitive Crustacea, which have an unpaired sexual opening.

The following summary of the structural features of the Symphyla, as represented by Scolopendrella, is based mainly on the works of Grassi, Haase, and Schmidt, with observations of my own.

Diagnostic or essential characters of Symphyla.—Head shaped as in Thysanura (Cinura), with the Y-shaped tergal suture, which occurs commonly in insects (Thysanura, Collembola, Dermaptera, Orthoptera, Platyptera, Neuroptera, etc.), but is wanting in Myriopoda (Diplopoda and Chilopoda); antennæ[8] unlike those of Myriopoda in being very long, slender, and moniliform. Clypeus distinct. Labrum emarginate, with six converging teeth. Mandibles 2–jointed, consisting of a vestigial stipes and distal or molar joint, the latter with eight teeth. First maxillæ with an outer and inner mala situated on a well-developed stipes; with a minute, 1–jointed palpus. Second pair of maxillæ: each forming two oblong flat pieces, median sutures distinct, with no palpi; these pieces are toothed in front, and appear to be homologous with the two median pieces of the gnathochilarium of Diplopoda. Hypopharynx? Epipharynx?

Trunk with from fifteen to sixteen dorsal, more or less free subequal scutes, the first the smallest. Pedigerous segments twelve; also twelve pairs of 5–jointed legs, which are of nearly equal length, the first pair 4–, the others 5–jointed, all ending in two claws, as in Synaptera and winged insects. A pair of 1–jointed anal cerci homologous with those of Thysanura and Orthoptera, into each of which opens a large abdominal silk-gland. Abdominal segments with movable styles or “pseudopods” (“Parapodia” of Latzel and of Schmidt), like those of Campodea and Machilis, and situated on the base of the coxal joint in front of the ventral sac. Within the body near the base of each abdominal style is an eversible coxal sac or blood-gill (Fig. 15, cg). The single genital opening is on the fourth trunk-segment in both sexes (Fig. 15, indicated by the arrow). The malpighian tubes (ur. t) are two in number, opening into the digestive canal at the anterior end of the hind intestine; they extend in front to the third or second segment from the head. They are broad and straight at their origin, becoming towards the end very slender and convoluted.

The three divisions of the digestive tract are as in insects, the epithelium of the mid-gut being histologically as in Campodea and Japyx; rectal glands are present. A pair of very large salivary glands are situated in the first to the fourth trunk-segments, consisting of a glandular portion with its duct, which unite into a common duct opening on the under side of the head, probably in the labium.

But a single pair of stigmata is present, and these are situated in the front of the head, beneath the insertion of the antennæ and within the stipes of the mandibles; the tracheæ are very fine, without spiral threads (tænidia), and mostly contained within the head, two fine branches extending on each side into the second trunk-segment.

After birth the body increases in length by the addition of new segments at the growing point.

In respect to the nervous system, there are no diagnostic characters; there are, however, not as many as two pairs of ganglia to a segment. The brain is well developed, sending a pair of slender nerves to the small eyes. The ganglia of the segment bearing the first pair of legs is fused with the subœsophageal ganglion. Grassi was unable to detect a true sympathetic system, but he suspects the existence of a very small frontal ganglion.

The slender dorsal vessel, provided with ostia and valvules, pulsates along the entire length of the trunk; an aorta passes into the head.

The internal genital organs of both sexes are paired, and extend along the greater part of the trunk; in either sex they may be compared to two long, slender, straight cords extending from the fourth to the tenth pair of legs. The two oviducts do not unite before reaching the sexual opening (Fig. 15, ovd).

The male sexual organs are more complicated than the feminine. The paired testicular tubes lie in trunk-segments 6 to 12, on each side, and partly under the intestinal canal, communicating with each other by a cross-anastomosis situated under the intestine, and which, like the testes, is filled with sperm. Of the paired seminal ducts (vas deferens) in trunk-segment 4, each unites again into a thick tube, sending a blind tube forward into the third segment. Under the place of union of the two vasa deferentia arise the paired ductus ejaculatorii, which open beneath in the uterus masculinus. The anterior blind ends of the vasa deferentia form a sort of small paired vesiculæ seminales in which a great quantity of ripe sperm is stored. The uterus masculinus is in its structure homologous with the evaginable penis of Pauropus, Polyxenus, and some diplopods, and the sexual opening has without doubt become secondarily unpaired. The sexual opening is rather long and is closed by two longitudinal folds. “In several respects the male sexual organs of Scolopendrella are like those of Pauropus; in the last-named form we have indeed an unpaired testis, but also in Scolopendrella we see the beginning of such a singleness; namely, the presence of an anastomosis uniting the two tubes, their communication by means of a transverse connecting canal and a glandular structure in the epithelium forming them. The male sexual organs of Pauropus differ only through a still greater complication.” (Schmidt.)

Scolopendrella in habits resembles chilopods, being found in company with Geophilus burrowing deep in light sand under leaves, or living at the surface of the ground under sticks or stones. It is very agile in its movements, and is probably carnivorous. It was considered by Haase to be eyeless, but the presence of two ocelli has been demonstrated both by Grassi and by Schmidt. Whether the pigment and corneous facet are present is not certain. The embryology is entirely unknown (although Henshaw reports finding a hexapodous young one), and it need not be said that a knowledge of it is a very great desideratum. It is most probable that the young is hexapodous, since the first pair of limbs are 4–jointed, all the rest 5–jointed; while Newport, and also Ryder, observed specimens with nine, ten, eleven, and twelve pairs, and Wood-Mason confirms their observations, “which prove that a pair of legs is added at each moult,” and he concludes that the addition of new segments “therefore takes place in this animal by the intercalation of two at each moult between the antepenultimate and penultimate sterna, as in the Chilognatha, and as also in some of the Chilopoda.”

There is but one family, Scolopendrellidæ, and a single genus, Scolopendrella, which seems to be, like other archaic types, cosmopolitan in its distribution.

Our commonest species is S. immaculata Newport, which occurs from Massachusetts to Cordova, Mexico, and in Europe from England to the Mediterranean and Russia; Mr. O. F. Cook tells me he has found a species in Liberia, West Africa. The other species are S. notacantha Gervais, Europe and Eastern United States; S. nivea Scopoli (S. gratiæ Ryder), Europe and United States; S. latipes Scudder, Massachusetts.