12 IilUTISH ORTHOPTKRA. 



certain that animal food, often in the form of other 

 insects, is most natural to earwigs, and that some species 

 feed upon it entirely (see p. 48, etc.). We might even 

 go so far as to suggest that the common earwig may not 

 be so entirely the gardener's enemy as it is generally 

 supposed to be. In Hawaii earwigs Avere seen to 

 destroy the sugar-cane leaf-hopper (Perkinsiella sac- 

 charicida Kirkaldy), one of the species so engaged 

 being Anisolabis annulipes.* 



Whatever may be the real state of the case in the 

 matter of food, every naturalist ousrht to take a certain 



*j 



amount of interest in these insects, from the fact that 

 in them the "maternal solicitude' for eggs and young* 

 shows a height of development as marked as it is un- 

 expected in such ancient insects. Writers from De 

 Geer (1773) onwards have commented on it, and H, 

 Gateau de Kerville has collected much of the informa- 

 tion, and given to the Avorld an interesting paper on 

 the subject. f The young, on the other hand, have 

 been known to devour the dead body of their mother. J 



Perhaps earwigs are nauseous and not often eaten, 

 though Newstead ( { Entomologist,' 1895, p. 139) found 

 two specimens of Forficula in birds' stomachs during 

 seA^ere weather. Spiders preying on earwigs, and the 

 method of securing their prey, are referred to in 

 6 Entom.' 1865, p. 227. Reference to parasites of 

 earwigs will be found in Butler's ' Household Insects' ; 

 ' Entomologist,' 1876, p. 263, and 1889, p. 309 ; ' Ent, 

 Mo. Mag.' 1889, pp. 282 and 459; WestAvood's 

 'Introd. Mod. Class. Ins.' i, p. 404; H. H. Brindley's 

 paper in ' Camb. Philos. Soc. Proc.' July, 1918; etc. 



Being adepts at running, earwigs have but little 

 occasion to use their wing's, and are seldom seen to 



O ' 



employ them. As they hide in crevices and dark 

 corners during the day, seeking their prey at night, it 



* R. C. L. Perkins, Hawaiian Gazette Co. Honolulu, 1903. 

 f H. G-. de Kerville, ' Accouplement, oeufs, et amour maternel des For- 

 ficulides/ Rouen, 1907. 



J AVestwood, ' Mod. Class Ins.' p. 403. 



Vide H. H. Brindley, ' Proc. Camb. Philos. Soc.' July, 1918. 



