MAYFLOWER, the vessel which carried from Southampton, England, to Plymouth, Massachusetts, the Pilgrims who established the first permanent colony in New England. It was of about 180 tons burden, and in company with the "Speedwell" sailed from Southampton on the 5th of August 1620, the two having on board 120 Pilgrims. After two trials the "Speedwell" was pronounced unseaworthy, and the "Mayflower" sailed alone from Plymouth, England, on the 6th of September with the 100 (or 102) passengers, some 41 of whom on the 11th of November (O.S.) signed the famous "Mayflower Compact" in Provincetown Harbor, and a small party of whom, including William Bradford, sent to choose a place for settlement, landed at what is now Plymouth, Massachusetts, on the 11th of December (21st N.S.), an event which is celebrated, as Forefathers' Day, on the 22nd of December. A "General Society of Mayflower Descendants" was organized in 1894 by lineal descendants of passengers of the "Mayflower" to "preserve their memory, their records, their history, and all facts relating to them, their ancestors and their posterity." Every lineal descendant, over eighteen years of age, of any passenger of the "Mayflower" is eligible to membership. Branch societies have since been organized in several of the states and in the District of Columbia, and a triennial congress is held in Plymouth. See Azel Ames, _The May-Flower and Her Log_ (Boston, 1901); Blanche McManus, _The Voyage of the Mayflower_ (New York, 1897); _The General Society of Mayflower: Meetings, Officers and Members, arranged in State Societies, Ancestors and their Descendants_ (New York, 1901). Also the articles PLYMOUTH, MASS.; MASSACHUSETTS, §_History_; PILGRIM; and PROVINCETOWN, MASS. MAY-FLY. The Mayflies belong to the Ephemeridae, a remarkable family of winged insects, included by Linnaeus in his order Neuroptera, which derive their scientific name from [Greek: ephêmeros], in allusion to their very short lives. In some species it is possible that they have scarcely more than one day's existence, but others are far longer lived, though the extreme limit is probably rarely more than a week. The family has very sharply defined characters, which separate its members at once from all other neuropterous (or pseudo-neuropterous) groups. These insects are universally aquatic in their preparatory states. The eggs are dropped into the water by the female in large masses, resembling, in some species, bunches of grapes in miniature. Probably several months elapse before the young larvae are excluded. The sub-aquatic condition lasts a considerable time: in _Cloeon_, a genus of small and delicate species, Sir J. Lubbock (Lord Avebury) proved it to extend over more than six months; but in larger and more robust genera (e.g. _Palingenia_) there appears reason to believe that the greater part of three years is occupied in preparatory conditions.