230 AFFECTION OF INSECTS FOR THEIR YOUNG. 



them — should be found to feed upon the inside of a dog, devouring only 

 those parts not essential to life, while it cautiously left uninjured the heart, 

 arteries, lungs, and intestines, — should we not regard such an instance as 

 a perfect prodigy, as an example of instinctive forbearance almost 

 miraculous ? 



Some Ichneumons, instead of burying their eggs in the body of ti.e 

 larvas that are to serve their young for food, content themselves with gluing 

 them to the skin of their prey. This is the case with Scolia jiamfrons, 

 which my learned entomological friend M. Passerini of Florence has found 

 places its eggs on the larva of a large beetle (^Oryctes nasicornis) ,u^on which 

 when hatched the larva of the Scotia feeds, by introducing the three first 

 segments of its body into the belly of its victim, always between the sixth 

 and seventh segment, so that this insect is a semi-internal parasite.* 

 Another tribe, whose activity and perseverance are equally conspicuous, 

 which includes the beautiful genus Chrysis and many other hymenopterous 

 and dipterous insects, imitating the insidious cuckoo, contrive to introduce 

 their eggs into the nests in which bees and other insects have deposited 

 theirs. . With this view they are constantly on the watch, and the moment 

 the unsuspecting mother has quitted her cell for the purpose of collecting 

 a store of food or materials, glide into it and leave an egg, the germ of a 

 future assassin of the larva, that is to spring from that deposited by its side. 



The females of the insects of which we have been speaking, in provid- 

 ing for their offspring, are saved the trouble of furnishing them with any 

 habitation. Either they occupy that of another insect, or find a con- 

 venient abode within the body of that on which they feed. But upon the 

 maternal affection of another large hymenopterous tribe, belonging to 

 Latreille's Family of Burrowers (Fossores), whose young in like manner 

 feed on other insects, is imposed the arduous task not merely of col- 

 lecting a supply of food, but of inclosing it along with, their eggs in cells 

 or burrows often of considerable depth, and dug with great labor in sand, 

 wood, or the solid earth. 



The general economy of these insects is similar. Having first dug a 

 cylindrical cavity of the requisite dimensions, and deposited an egg at the 

 bottom, they inclose along with it one or more caterpillars, spiders, or 

 other insects, each particular species for the most part selecting a distinct 

 kind, as a provision for the young one when hatched, and sufficiently 

 abundant to nourish it until it becomes a pupa. Many thus furnish seve- 

 ral cells. This process, however, is varied by different species, some of 

 whose operations are worthy of a more detailed description. 



One of the most early histories of the procedure of an insect of this kind, 

 probably the common sand-wasp (Ammophila vulgaris), is left us by the 

 excellent Ray, who observed it along with his friend Willughby. On the 

 22d of June ]667, he tells us, they noticed this insect dragging a green 

 caterpillar thrice as big as itself, which after thus conveying about fifteen 

 feet, it deposited at the entrance of a hole previously dug in the sand. 

 Then removing a pellet of earth from its mouth, it descended into the 

 cavity, and, presently returning, dragged along with it the caterpillar. 

 After staying awhile it again ascended, then rolled pieces of earth into 



' Osservazioni sulle Larve, Ninfe, ^c. (Pise, 1840). Gu6rin-Meneville, B^vue Zoolog. 1841, 



