ephemerIdæ

pl. [Mod. Lat. ephemer (a) (q. v.), and Lat. fem. pl. adj. suff. -idœ.] 1. Entom .: May-flies. A family of neuropterous. insects; family Subulicornes. Antennæ very small, three jointed. Wings perpendicular or nearly so, anterior pair much the larger. Body terminating in three sete. Anterior legs protruded forward to be used as organs of touch. The larve, which, except that they want wings, much resemble the perfect insect, are aquatic, breathing by branchise. According to Swammerdam, they are three years in reaching the perfect state, when they come forth immediately to deposit their eggs and die. The chief genera are Oxycypha, with only two wings; Cloe with four, the hinder ones, however, being minute; Baëtis and Ephemera with the inferior wings larger, the former with three ocelli, the latter with two. [EPHEMERA.] 2. Palæont.: Mr Scudder believes his Platephem era antiqua , from the Devonian rocks of North America, to be one of the Ephemeride. The family is believed also to have had representatives in the Carboniferous rocks. [EPHEMERITES.] If so, then its discovery in all the intermediate strata is only a question of time. ě-phěm-er-id, 8. [EPHEMERIDE.] Zool.: An insect of the family Ephemeride (q. v.). "Larger than that of any recent Ephemerids." -Nicholson: Palæont . , i. 406. ě-phěm-er-Is (pl. ě-phe-měr-I-dēs), s. [Gr =a diary.] IMG:content-1064.png:[graphic] *I. Ordinary Language: 1. A journal, a diary, an account of daily trans actions. 2. An almanac. "Let him make an ephemerides, read Sui et the calcu lat or's works, Scaliger De Emend at i one Temporum, and Petavius his adversary, till he understand them."- Bur ton: Anatomy of Melancholy, p. 281. II. Technically : ephemerist -ites .] ERA (q. v.).