EGGS. 



also as practical information, fit for a reasonable man 

 to receive, to the many who depend on the food-crops 

 for their livelihood, and who will thankfully accept all 

 reliable aid that may tend to lessen their yearly losses 

 through insect attack. 



In order to trace the progress of insect life onward 

 from its very commencement, with the certainty that 

 the eggs which we may wish to observe have been 

 deposited by any special insect, we may take the 

 females, when about to lay, and secure them under a 

 glass, and thus we can study the characteristics of the 

 ■eggs laid by different kinds of insects. 



Fig. 8, 



€2 



■ 1 , Eggs of Beet-fly ; 2 & 3, eggs of Butterflies, magnified. 



Insect eggs are of various shapes : they may be 

 round, or oval ; conical, or pear-shaped ; or of other 

 forms ; sometimes, as seen under a magnifying-glass, 

 they are beautifully marked with stripes, net-work, or 

 other patterns ; and they also differ in the nature of 

 the outer coat, which sometimes is hard and crisp, 

 sometimes a mere flexible film. These eggs are, for 

 the most part, laid by the parent insect on, in, or near 

 the substance, be it j^Iant or animal, which is to be 

 the food of the " maggot " or other kind of larva 

 which will presently hatch from them. Sometimes 

 the eggs are laid in places from whence they will be 

 carried to a suitable feeding place for the grubs that 

 hatch from them. The Horse Bot-fly, for instance, 

 lays her eggs on the horse, and by means of that 

 animal (or another) licking them off they are carried 

 to the mouth and thence pass down to the stomach. 

 Some kinds of insects, by means of apparatus forming 



