Exetasks.] BRITISH ICHNEUMONS. 293 



The larva (first described by me in IC.M.^I. 1903, p. 163) is ovate, 

 deplanate, curved and primrose-yellow ; it consists of fourteen segments, 

 of which the cephalic alone bears distinctive markings ; the lateral lobes 

 throughout the body are discreted by a more or less distinctly impressed 

 line above and beneath, and bear concolorous spiracles. There appear 

 to be no palpi nor prolegs. The cephalic segment is coriaceous ; the 

 antennae are represented by two smooth and hardly darker tubercles, 

 behind each of which, at the inner orbit of the eye, is a semilunar area of 

 the same colour and glabrosity. The eyes, in the fully fed lar\'a, are 

 represented by two subcutaneous pwple patches at the upper lateral base 

 of the cephalic segment. Two oblique and linear impressions run down 

 from near the antennae to the apex of the clypeus, which is piceous and 

 extends laterally to the bases of the mandibles ; the labrum, except at its 

 circular apex (between the apices of the mandibles), is not infuscate. The 

 mandibles are very distinct, broad and subquadrate, margined with piceous 

 colouring ; at the upper apex of each is an acuminate, slender, nigrescent 

 tooth ; their bases are dark and corneous, extending some distance back- 

 wards. The labium is subtriangular, situated in a subrectangular impres- 

 sion below the centre of the mandibles. Length, 12 mm. The per- 

 fect insects usually emerge the following year ; but two, received in 

 October, 1901, were still healthy larvae in May, 1903. 



The cocoon is described by DeGeer — whose imaginal description of 

 both sexes is particularly lucid ; but his fig. 1 1 is poor, representing the 

 petiole as distinct, the abdominal segmentation much too pronounced 

 and resembling that of Mcsosfi'mis ohiioxius [cf. LB. ii. 260) — as oval, black 

 and shining. No one seems to have noticed it since but Brischke, who 

 says it is similar to that of ^.y^rw/ra/tf/-. It is about 16 mm. in length 

 and 4^ in breadth, cylindrical, with the apices of equal size and broadly 

 rounded ; the outer envelope is very stout, black, externally somewhat 

 dull and smooth with but faint indications of threads, internally it is 

 glabrous and strongly nitidulous ; within this and connected with it in no 

 way is a second cocoon, testaceous-brown with a slightly paler central band, 

 of much thinner and more flimsy consistency, resembling gold-beaters- 

 skin ; and within this again is a third, also detached and only slightly 

 paler and thinner than the second, envelope ; over the outer side of the 

 third is a fourth entirely free one which, however, covers but one half of 

 it (presumably the anal half, in which the pupal liquid is contained). I 

 have seen examples in which the second envelope was constructed in two 

 distinct sections, overlapping but unconnected, around the centre (point- 

 ing, probably, to the conclusion that these ichneumonidous cocoons are 

 built in two halves, from either extremity in turn, and finally connected 

 around the middle, which is so often of a paler colour than the remainder). 

 Within the innermost cocoon the larva spins no means of attachment but, 

 on the contrary, has certain powers of muscular locomotion. The imago 



