AGAONID.E. 59 



These figures are not like the preceding and succeeding illustrations 

 in these notes, from the drawings of A. H. Haliday, hut are copied 

 from the plate in Dr. Coquerel's memoir, here mentioned. See 

 ' Revue et Magasin de Zoologie,' Ser. 2, vol. vii. 365 and 422. 



The Leucospidas appear to be the highest development of the 

 Chalcidiae ; and the Agaonidse -will be said to be the most rudimentary 

 form of the tribe, or the earliest created among them, or the first 

 " won from the void and formless infinite." In them affinities may be 

 found between the Chalcidiae and other tribes of Hymenoptera, for 

 links between tribes will be sought in vain among the more organized 

 forms. The above figures exhibit the most aboriginal structure of the 

 Agaonidae. 



The Agaonidse appear as yet chiefly in three different aspects, and 

 in three different regions. The first region is the Mauritius, where 

 they have been discovered by the researches of Dr. Coquerel. Here 

 the three species figui'ed are said to be " condemned to eternal dark- 

 ness" in the central regions of figs. These figs are the fruit of Ficus 

 terragena, and are unfit for human food. Dr. Coquerel found the 

 three species (Apocrypta paradoxa, A. perplexa and Sycocrypta 

 cceca) in abundance in the interior of these figs, together with great 

 numbers of a fourth species, which he named Chalcis ? explorator, 

 and which he believed to be parasitic on the other three species. 

 However, he did not ascertain it to be so, but merely observed that 

 the four species were mingled together, and he had previously seen the 

 explorator flying about the outside of the figs. The other three 

 species, he observes, are remarkably inactive ; when disturbed they 

 roll themselves together and remain motionless : they have no eyes, 

 no ocelli, no palpi, no maxilke, no wings ; but have powerful 

 mandibles. Dr. Coquerel mentions that they have analogy with 

 Scleroderma contracta, and supposes that the males are winged and 

 unknown, and may have their place next to Scleroderma. Scleroderma 

 has no near affinity with the Bethylidae, and has been supposed by 

 some to belong to the Mutillidae, and by others to be the female of 

 Myzine ; it has some resemblance to the female Australian and 

 South American Thynni, and by these connections the primitive and 

 semichaotic forms discovered by Dr. Coquerel expand into the nume- 

 rous and powerful tribe of aculeate Hymenoptera, surpassing other 

 insects in intellect, of which the wasp and the bee are the most 

 familiar examples, though a great part control other orders of insects, 

 by using them as food for their young. Scleroderma seems to have 

 more affinity with Typhlopone, the " worker " of Labidus, and with 

 Dichthadia glaberrima, the supposed female of Dorylus ; and thereby 

 the multitudinous tribe of ants, whose economy is so remarkable, 

 emerges from the blind and radical Apocryptae and Sycocryptae, the 



