STYLOPS. Ill 



like a Staphylinus. He put it under a glass, and placed it in the 

 sun, where it became quite furious in its confinement, and never 

 ceased running about for two hours. The elytra, or processes, 

 were kept in quick vibration, as well as the wings. It buzzed 

 against the side of the glass, touching it with its head, and 

 tumbled about on its back. 



So much for its appearance on the wing. Now, how do we 

 know when a bee is stylopised ? If, upon examining the upper 

 segments of the abdomen of the bee, we find a slight incrustation 

 or protuberance on the fourth segment ; that is a sure indication 

 of the fact. Kirby, who first noticed this protuberance, mistook 

 it for an Acarus, and in order to examine it more minutely endea- 

 voured to disengage it with a pin. "What was my astonishment," 

 he says, "when I drew forth from the body of the bee a white, 

 fleshy larva a quarter of an inch long." This white, fleshy larva 

 is now known to be the female Stylops. She is simply a white, 

 fleshy maggot, without the least trace of legs or wings, furnished 

 only with a flattened, horny, anterior extremity, which enables her 

 to push through the segments of the bee's abdomen, and just 

 below this horny plate is a transverse aperture, through which the 

 male fecundates the eggs, and afterwards the young larvae emerge. 

 The eggs can be seen through the body of the female, and the 

 eggs are hatched in this situation. After having extracted this 

 larva or female, Kirby attempted to extract a second, but now his 

 astonishment was greatly intensified, when, instead of getting out 

 another larva, the skin burst as he was extracting it, and a head 

 as black as ink, with large, staring eyes, and antennae consisting of 

 two branches, broke forth, and moved itself from side to side. It 

 looked like a little imp of darkness, just emerging from the 

 infernal regions. This was, of course, the male, as the first was 

 the female Stylops. 



The number of eggs laid by the female is very considerable. 

 The little larvae, when first hatched, are hexapods, and very active 

 little creatures, quickly making their way out of their mother's 

 body by the transverse aperture mentioned above. Smith tells us 

 he has several times bred these larvae by keeping the infested bees 

 in confinement, and supplying them daily with fresh flowers, such 



