“The long streamer-like hind legs of many water-bugs, for example Notonecta, approach more nearly our artificial oars. These legs are turned out from the bottom.
“There is no doubt but that the legs of insects, as regards the many-sidedness and exactitude of their locomotive actions, place the similar contrivances of other animals far in the shade. We shall be forced to admire these ingenious levers still more, however, when we take into consideration their energy and strength. That the force with which the locomotive muscles of insects is drawn together is enormous compared with that of vertebrates, we may learn if we try to subdue the rhythmical movements of the thorax of a large butterfly by the pressure of our finger or to open against the insect’s will the closed jumping leg of a grasshopper, or the fossorial shovel of a mole-cricket.”
LITERATURE ON LEGS AND FEET
MacLeay, W. S. On the structure of the tarsus in the tetramerous Coleoptera of the French entomologists. (Trans. Linn. Soc. London, xv, 1825, pp. 63–73.)
Speyer, O. Untersuchung der Beine der Schmetterlinge. (Isis, 1843, pp. 161–207, 243–264.)
Pokorsky Joravko, A. von. Quelques remarques sur le dernier article du tarse des Hyménoptères. (Bull. Soc. imp. Natur. Moscou, 1844, xvii, pp. 140–159. Ref. in Isis, 1848, v, p. 347.)
Rossmassler, E. A. Das Bein der Insekten. (Aus der Heimath, 1860, 3 kap., pp. 327–334, Fig.)
West, Tuffen. The foot of the fly; its structure and action; elucidated by comparison with the feet of other insects, etc. Part I. (Trans. Linn. Soc. London, xxiii, 1861, pp. 393–421, 1 Pl.)
Sundevall, C. On insektenas extremiteter samt deras hufoud och munddelar. (Kongl. Vetenskaps Akad. Handlingar. iii, Nr. 9, 1861.)
Lindemann, C. Notizen zur Lehre vom ausseren Skelete der Insekten (Gelenke und Muskeln der Füsse). 1 Taf. (Bull. Soc. imp. d. Natur. Moscou, xxxvii, 1864, pp. 426–432.)