[Illustration: After Miall and Denny, _The Cockroach_, Lovell Reeve & Co.
FIG. 10.--Dorsal Muscles, Heart and Pericardial Tendons of Cockroach.]
_Muscular System._--The muscles in the Hexapoda are striated, as in Arthropods generally, the large fibres being associated in bundles which are attached from point to point of the cuticle, so as to move adjacent sclerites with respect to one another (see figs. 8, 10). For example, the contraction of the tergo-sternal muscles, connecting the dorsal with the ventral sclerites of the abdomen, lessens the capacity of the abdominal region, while the contraction of the powerful muscles arising from the thoracic walls, and inserted into the proximal ends of the thighs, flexes or extends the legs.
_Circulatory System._--Insects afford an excellent illustration of the remarkable type of blood-system characterizing the Arthropoda. The dorsal vessel is an elongate tube, whose abdominal portion is usually chambered, forming a contractile heart (fig. 10). At the constrictions between the chambers are paired slits, through which the blood passes from the surrounding pericardial sinus. The dorsal vessel is prolonged anteriorly into an aorta, through which the blood is propelled into the great body-cavity or haemocoel. After bathing the various tissues and organs, the blood returns dorsalwards into the pericardial sinus through fine perforations of its floor, and so makes its way into the heart again. Some water-bugs, e.g. of the families _Belostomatidae_, _Nepidae_, _Corixidae_ and _Hydrometridae_ have a pulsating sac at each knee-joint to assist the flow of blood through the legs, while in dragon-flies and locusts (_Acridiidae_) there is a ventral pulsating diaphragm, which forms the roof of a sinus enclosing the nerve-cords.
[Illustration: After Miall and Denny, _The Cockroach_, Lovell Reeve & Co.
FIG. 11.--Ventral Portion of Air-Tubes in Cockroach.]
_Respiratory System._--As mentioned above, respiration by means of air-tubes (tracheae) is a most characteristic feature of the Hexapoda. An air-tube consists of an epithelium of large polygonal cells with a thin basement-membrane externally and a chitinous layer internally, the last-named being continuous with the outer cuticle. The chitinous layer is usually strengthened by thread-like thickenings which, in the region close to the outer opening of the tube, form a network enclosing polygonal areas, but which, through most of the tracheal system, are arranged spirally, the strengthening thread not forming a continuous spiral, but being interrupted after a few turns around the tube. The tracheal system in Hexapods is very complex, forming a series of longitudinal trunks with transverse anastomosing connexions (fig. 11), and extending by the finest sub-division and by repeated branching into all parts of the body. In insects of active flight the tubes swell out into numerous air-sacs, by which the breathing capacity is much increased.