nepticula

[Lat. =a little granddaughter, from neptis (q. v.).] Entom.: The typical genius of the family of Nepticulide. Nepticula aurella is a golden-brown 2833 moth, a quarter of an inch in extension of wing. The larva makes galleries in bramble leaves. Ν. splendid is sima iş closely allied, but has a black head. N. mic rother i ell a , the larva of which feeds on nut leaves, is the smallest known moth, being only an eighth of an inch acro the extended wings. Lamanda Mod. něp-ti-cu-li-dæ, s. pl. [Mod. Lat. nepticul (a); Entom.: A family of Tineina. The head is rough, the antenne short and thick, the anterior wings rather broad and short, often with coarse scales, the posterior wings lanceolate. Larva with no true legs, but with nine prolegs. The smallest size moths known. Some are highly beautiful. něp'-tis, s. [Lat.=a granddaughter.] phaline. It is closely akin to Limen it is. They are Entom.: A genus of Butterflies, sub-family Nymdark brown butterflies, with white markings. Found in India, Africa, . Two are European. Něp-tune, s . [Lat. Neptunus .] W 1. Roman Myth.: The fabled god of the sea; the son of Saturn and Rhea, and the brother of Jupiter and Pluto. He is generally identified with the Greek Poseidon, and is variously represented; sometimes with a trident in his right hand, a dolphin in his left, and with one of his feet resting on part of a ship; at others in a chariot drawn by sea-horses, with a triton on each side. He was said to preside over horses and the manger. Neptune. 2. Astron .: A planet, the most remote of any yet discovered. Irregularities having been remarked in the movements of the planet Uranus, not to be accounted for by the attraction of any known heavenly body, two astronomers, M. Leverrier in France, and Mr. Adams in England, correctly reasoning that the perturbations must proceed from a yet undiscovered planet, independently calculated the probable place in the sky which such a planet would occupy. On September 20, 1846, Leverrier's calculations were communicated to Dr. Galle of Berlin, who promptly looked on the heavens, and the very same evening discovered the planet afterward named Neptune within a single degree of its calculated position. The diameter of Neptune is nearly 35,000 miles. Its density is only a fifth that of the earth, its mean distance from the sun 2,792.000,000 miles, and its year 165 times as long as one of ours. Mr. La ell discovered that it has one satel lite. Neptune's drinking-cup, s. nerite *nere, v. i . [For ne were.] Were not. nër-e-id (pl. nër-ě-Idş, *ně-re-1-dēs), subst. [Lat. Nereis (gen it. Nereid is ), from Gr. Nereis =a sea-nymph, a daughter of Nereus an ancient seagod, from neros =wet; Fr. néréide.] 1. Cla . Mythol .: Nymphs of the sea, daughters of Nereus and Doris. They are said by most ancient writers to have been fifty in number, but Pro pert i us makes them a hundred. The most celebrated of them were A mph i trite, the wife of Neptune; Thetis, the mother of Achilles; Galatea, Doto, . They were originally represented as beautiful nymphs; afterward described as beings with green hair, and the lower part of their body fish-like. 2. Zool .: Any individual of the family Nereide, or the genus Nereis (q. v.). "Resembling the jaws of the living Nereids," -Nicholson: Palæont., i. 316.