In the larva of Macrurocampa marthesia the cervical or secretory gland (Fig. 366, 5) is situated in the 1st and 2d thoracic segments, extending to the hinder edge of the latter and lying between the nervous cord and the œsophagus and proventriculus, and when empty the bulk of it lies a little to one side of the median line of the body. It is partly held in place by small tracheæ, one quite large branch being sent to it from near the prothoracic spiracle. The short, large duct, leading from it to the transverse opening in the membrane between the head and prothoracic segment, is a little narrower than this opening, and is kept distended by tænidia, or a series of short, spiral threads which are pale, not honey-yellowish, in color. This duct lies on one side of the prothoracic ganglion, resting just under the commissures passing up to the brain; it is also situated between the two silk ducts.
The very distensible sac (Fig. 366, 5) is rendered elastic by a curious arrangement of the cuticle, the tænidia of the duct itself being represented by very thickly-scattered, irregular, separate, sinuous, chitinous ridges, which stand up from the cuticular lining of the wall of the sac (Fig. 366, 6). The secretory cells of the walls of this sac in Cerura vinula are said by Klemensiewicz to be large hexagonal cells, resembling those of silk-glands, having like them large branched nuclei.
The fluid thrown out is said by Poulton to be formic acid; it causes violent effervescence when allowed to fall upon sodium-bicarbonate, and colors blue litmus paper red. It also appears from the researches of Latter that these creatures in the imago state secrete free potassium hydroxid, a substance for the first time known to exist in the animal kingdom.
In the caterpillar of Astyanax archippus (Limenitis disippus) a dark, bladder-like sac is everted, but the lateral tubes appear to be wanting, and no spray is sent out; it occurs in the larvæ of many Nymphalidæ and other butterflies and moths.
These glands are functionally active in Perophora, but obsolete (at least the external openings) in Lacosoma.
The osmeterium in Papilio larvæ.—The caterpillars of the swallowtailed butterflies (Papilio, Doritis, and Thais), as is well known, when irritated thrust out from a transverse slit on the upper part of the prothoracic segment a large orange-yellow V-shaped fleshy tubular process (the osmeterium), from which is diffused a more or less melonlike but disagreeable, in some cases insufferable, odor; the secretion is acid and reddens litmus paper. The mechanism has been described and figured by Klemensiewicz.
When at rest, or retracted, the osmeterium lies in the upper part of the body in the three thoracic segments, and is crossed obliquely by several muscular bundles attached to the walls of the body, and by the action of these muscles the evagination of the osmeterium is strongly promoted. After eversion the tubes are slowly retracted by two slender muscles inserted at the end of each fork or tube, and arising from the sides of the 3d segment behind the head, crossing each other in the median line (Fig. 366, 7 r.m.). The secretion is formed by an oval mass of glandular cells at the base of the forks; in the glandular mass is a furrow-like depression about which the secretory cells are grouped. The secretion collects in very fine drops on the side of each furrow opposite the glandular cells.
According to C. D. Ash the larva of an Australian Notodontid (Danima banksii Lewin) protrudes from the under side of the prothoracic segment a Y-shaped red organ like that of Papilio; no fluid or odor is given out.
Dorsal and lateral eversible metameric sacs in other larvæ.—The showy caterpillars of Orgyia and its allies have a conspicuous coral-red tubercle on the back of the 6th and also the 7th abdominal segment, which on irritation are elongated, the end of the tubercles being eversible. When at rest the summit is crateriform, but on eversion the end becomes rounded and conical. These osmeteria are everted by blood pressure, and retracted by a muscle. Fig. 366, 9, represents a section of an osmeterium of Orgyia leucostigma when retracted by the muscle (m); at the bottom of the crater are the secreting or glandular cells (gc), being modified hypodermal cells. These doubtless serve as terrifying organs to ichneumons and other insect enemies, and though we have been unable to detect any odor emanating from the tubercles, yet possibly they give out a scent perceived by and disagreeable to their insect assailants.
