INSECT LIFE IN INDIA AND HOW TO STUDY IT. 125 



parasitic on the rice-fly pest {Cecidomyia oryzce, W. Mason) which 

 causes considerable damage in the rice fields. This latter pest will 

 be considered under the Order Diptera. The Proctotrypid probably 

 lays its eggs in the Cecidomyid larvte and the grubs on hatching 

 out feed upon the former. The parasite was bred out from the 

 rice pest by Mr. Wood Mason when Superintendent of the Indiau 

 Museum. Fig. 43 shows the parasitic fly much enlarged, and to 

 the right the enlarged antenna to show its structure. It will not 

 improbably be found that this family is of the greatest economic use to 

 the agriculturist in India in keeping down the members of many 

 of the more minute pests attacking crops. As such its study, whilst 

 affording a rich field for new discoveries, will well repay him who 

 takes it up. 



Fam. VI. Chalcididse— Chalcid-Flies. 



The prothorax is capable of some movement, its angles do not 

 extend backwards to meet insertion of wings. The antennae are 

 elbowed, consisting of from seven to thirteen joints. The wings have 

 no system of cells in them ; there is a single well-marked nervure 

 running from the base near the front margin (costa), afterwards it 

 passes to the costa and gives off a very short vein more or less thicken- 

 ed at its termination. The insects are frequently of brilliant colours 

 and remarkable form. 



The species known number over 4,000, and of these 3,000 are 

 European. There is little reason to believe that the family is not 

 equally well represented in the tropics, the insects, owing to their minute 

 size, not having yet been worked at or collected. Observations have 

 already shown the writer that the family appears to be very well 

 represented in India, where it probably, economically, does a vast 

 amount of good. 



The larvae may live in galls, feeding on the larvae of the makers of 

 the galls ; others attack caterpillars, others pupse only ; some flourish 

 at the expense of bees or other Hymenoptera or of Coccidse and 

 Aphidse (Hemiptera), and some deposit their eggs in the egg-cases 

 of Blattidse (cockroaches), whilst others prey upon parasitic and useful 

 Tachnid flies. A little is known about some thirty or forty Indian 

 species. 



