DYTISCUS, in natural history, a genus of insects of the order Coleoptera. An tenna; setaceous ; feelers six, filiform ; hind-legs formed for swimming, fringed on the inner side, and nearly unarmed with claws. Nearly two hundred species of this genus have been enumerated. This has sometimes obtained the name of water-beetle, it being an aquatic ge nus, and rarely seen in flight except during the evening. One of the largest European species is the D. ,marginalis, about an inch long, of an ochre colour : the whole insect is of a polished surface on the upper part, and the wing-shells are each marked by two rows of scarcely perceptible impressed points. This in sect is not uncommon is stagnant waters, where its larva also resides, which is of a very extraordinary shape, and so unlike the animal into which it is at length trans formed, that no one, not conversant in entomology, would suppose it to have the most distant relationship to it. It is of a fifth letter of the alphabet, and 5 second vowel, has different pro nunciations in most languages. The Greeks have their eta, and epsilon e, or long and short e. The French have their
e open, pronounced much like our a in the words face and make; their e masculine, pronounced not unlike our y at the end of words, as liberte, liberty; their e feminine, or mute, very weakly if at all pronounc ed, added generally at the end of words, either to distinguish the feminine gender, or lengthen the syllable ; and their e be fore an m or n, which sounds.like our a in the word war: these are all exemplified in the words empechle or enfermie. In English there are three kinds of e, Th.:. the open or long e, as in the words bear, wear; the close or short e, as in wet, kept ; and mute e, which serves to lengthen the syl lable, as in love, came, &c.
As a numeral, E stands for 250. In music it denotes the tone eda.mi. In the calendar it is the fifth of the dominical letters. And in sea-charts it distinguishes all the easterly points ; thus, E. alone, de notes east, E. by S. and E. by N. east by south, and east by north.