Prof. Schaum on the Systematic Position of the Strepsiptera. 53 thick, though generally thickest in the middle and thinning away to the periphery — sometimes dying away before they reach it, and sometimes extending beyond it. They are generally united to the body of the vertebrse. Nothing in osteology is more curious than the condition of epiphyses in the long bones of Plesiosaurs; for here they are so enormously large as to form nearly the whole of the bone, the shaft being reduced to a mere girdle encircling the ends of the epiphyses. Young specimens of humerus or femur, with the shaft 2 or 3 inches long, have generally lost their epiphyses; and in one beautiful specimen from the Kimmeridge Clay of Cottenham, presented to the University by the Rev. S. Banks, a shaft nearly three inches in diameter has lost both epiphyses. It is quite tubular, smooth in the central part, which is perforated for the enormous arteries, and only shows signs of attachment at its thin ends, where the inner surface is rugged. Often, in the Greensand specimens, the epiphysis of the proximal end comes out. The shaft varies much in proportion, with the species. X. — On the Systematic Position of the Strepsiptera. By Professor Schaum*. The family of the Strepsiptera or Stylopidce, so remarkable in their mode of development, was first regarded as a group of Coleoptera by Burmeister (Handb. der Naturgesch., 1837), and placed by him in the immediate vicinity of the Bhipiphoridous genus Symhius, Sundev. (Isis, 1831, tab. 8) = /?^z/?z«fm5, Thunb., which is parasitic upon Blattce. This notion has since been adopted by Newman, Schiodte, and other entomologists, and most recently by Lacordaire, who, in the fifth volume of his ^ Genera des Coleopteres,' treats the Stylopidcs as a family of Beetles standing in immediate contact with the Rhipiphoridce, and in connexion therewith cites some of the reasons adduced by me in favour of this view, and in opposition to the objections raised against it. Leconte also, in his recently published work, the ^ Classifica-tion of the Coleoptera of North America,^ has placed the Stylo-pidce next the Rhipiphoridce, in consideration of their organiza-tion and development. In the " Report on the Progress of Entomology in the year 1861" (Wiegmann*s Archiv, xxviii. p. 328), Dr. Gerstacker makes the following remarks in con-* Translated by W. S. Dallas, F.L.S., from Wiegmann's 'Archiv,' 1864, p. 145.
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