WILLIAMS: LARRIDyE OF KANSAS. 195 



haps recently thrown out of the nest; under this the soil was 

 firmer, as though rain-packed. The whole affair had some- 

 what the appearance of a mud tube, such as are made by 

 crayfish. The hillock is illustrated in figure 116. Tachytes 

 mandibidaris is reported by W. H. Patton to make similar 

 tubes. I had not dug long before a confined, squeaky buzz 

 was heard, and soon the proprietor was brought to light from a 

 hole fully ten inches below the surface of the ground and four- 

 teen inches from the entrance. The latter I followed, and 

 found it to slant at an angle of about 60 degrees, the tunnel 

 being lost before I reached any of the cells. About two inches 

 beyond the wasp lay two nymphs of a species of Melanoplus. 

 One of these had the long, curved Tachytes egg (fig. 113) 

 transversely placed on the prosternum, its cephalic end se- 

 cured in the membrane behind and somewhat inside of the base 

 of one of the fore coxae. I dug carefully for nearly two hours, 

 during which time twenty cells and fifty-six acridians were 

 found. The main shaft of the nest was soon lost, but the cells 

 appeared strung along its length in a rather irregular man- 

 ner. With the exception of the one in which the wasp was 

 found, they were closed with earth. They were rather small 

 and often very close to one another. The locusts were dis- 

 tributed in these chambers as follows : 



2 cells contained 1 acridian each. 



4 cells contained 2 acridians each. 



10 cells contained 3 acridians each. 



4 cells contained 4 acridians each. 



20 56 



Fifty-one of the victims belonged to the tribe Melanopli. and 

 of these only one was mature ; the five remaining insects were 

 small species of full-grown Tryxalinfe, viz. : four Ageneotettix 

 deoruyn and one Orplmella near speciosa. 



A few of the locusts moved their antennge in a feeble man- 

 ner, while with fresh specimens could be found others dark- 

 ened and well on the road to decomposition. The cells were 

 penetrable by a heavy rain, and in nearly every case contained 

 a Tachytes egg or larva. Some of the latter were of good 

 size; one seemed about two-thirds grown. The larvae usually 

 lay in a curve over their food. The freshly hatch sd specimens 

 appeared much like the egg-, in beinT of rather uniform thick- 

 ness and showing very little indication of any segmentation. 

 The largest larva, however, had deep intersegmental incisions, 



