164 Forty-fifth Report on the State Museum. 



trunk, for if disturbed, they would frequently tiy up for a 

 short circuit and then return. The females, rarely seen until the 

 latter part of the afternoon, were always intent on oviposition 

 either getting in readiness to insert the ovipositor, or with it already 

 entered at various depths to a maximum of two inches, and with 

 the abdominal muscular sac aiding in oviposition, distended in 

 different degrees. The wood was apparently solid where the ovipo- 

 sition was occurring, but the bark had been jjerforated as numerously 

 by the wood-wasps as had been the decorticated portion. That the 

 wood was at least omparatively solid was shown by the firmness with 

 which the ovipositor clung to it. In an attempt to remove an example, 

 while holding it by the thorax and abdomen, the body was torn in two 

 near its terminal end. But by seizing the ovipositor between the 

 thumb and linger and pulling it steadily but gently, it could invariabl}^ 

 be withdrawn entire in from fifteen to twent}' seconds of time. 



The tree was passed daily in my walks to and from my office. The 

 Thalessas were observed for the last time on September 18th and the 

 Pemphredons on September 2 2d. 



In the notice of Thalessa lunator in my Fourth Report, the question 

 was asked: "Does Thalessa oviposit in exposed larv:e?" An ovipo- 

 sition of a large Ichneumonidan in a colony of a Datana on a hickory 

 tree, observed by me about the year 1860^ was described and referred, 

 from memory, to Thalessa lunator. In Dr. Riley's admirable paper on 

 "The Habits of Thalessa and Tremex," on pages 168-1 79 of Insect Life 

 for December, 1888, in replying to the above query, he has endeavored 

 to show that this method of oviposition was impossible to Thalessa, 

 and suggested that my memor3^ of the species that I had seen thus 

 engaged must have been at fault, — some other large Ichneumon hav- 

 ing been mistaken for Thalessa. That Dr. Riley is correct in this 

 opinion finds strong support in a notice entitled "Oviposition of 

 Anomalon sp.," by Prof. C. P. Gillette, in Entomological JVetcs, i, 



1890, p. 130, in which is related the oviposition of a large black 

 Anomalon species, in a colony of Datana niinistra, in a manner and_ 

 with all the attendant circumstances identical with the operations as 

 described by me. 



In the Journal of the JSTev} York 3Iicrosco2ncal Society/, for October, 



1891, page 135, Rev. J. L. Zabriskie gives an interesting account of 

 the very serious results attending a wound said to have been inflicted 

 by one of the " long stings " on the arm near the wrist of a robust, 

 healthy laboring man. " For four or five days intense pain, and great 

 swelling involving the entire arm, the axilla and a portion of the side 

 of the body, gave symptoms of a severe case of erysipelas." 



