47 



are gone ; the Cratitires, on the contrary, remain on tlie tree till May, and inclose the 

 eggs deposited by the gnats when they pricked them. In May the third sort of fruit, 

 called Onii, begins to be produced by the wild fig-trees. This is much bigger than 

 the other two, and when it grows to a certain size, and its buds begin to open, it is 

 pricked in that part by the gnats of the Cratitires, which are strong enough to go from 

 one fruit to another to deposit their eggs. It sometimes happens that the gnats of 

 the Cratitires are slow to come forth in certain parts, while the Orni in those very 

 parts are disposed to receive them. In this case the husbandman is obliged to look 

 for the Cratitires in another part, and fix them at the end of the branches of those fig- 

 trees, whose Orni are in a fit disposition to be pricked by'the gnats. If they miss the 

 opportunity, the Oi-ni fall, and the gnats of the Cratitires fall away; none but those 

 that are well acquainted with the culture know the critical moment of doing this, and 

 in order to know it their eyes are perpetually fixed on the bud of the fig, for that part 

 not only indicates the time that the insects are to issue forth, but also when the fig is 

 to be successfully pricked ; if the bud is too hard and compact, the gnat cannot lay 

 its eggs, and the fig drops when the bud is too open. 



" The use of all these three sorts of fruit is to ripen the fruit of the garden fig in 

 the following manner. During the months of June and July the peasants take the 

 Omi at the time their gnats are ready to break out, and carry them to the garden fig- 

 trees ; if they do not nick the moment, the Orni fall, and the fruit of the domestic fig- 

 tree not ripening, will in a very little time fall in like manner. The peasants are so 

 well acquainted with these precious moments, that every morning in making their in- 

 spection they only transfer to their garden fig-trees such Orni as are well-conditioned, 

 otherwise they lose their crop. In this case, however, they have one remedy, though 

 an indifferent one, which is to strew over the garden fig-trees another plant in whose 

 fruit there is a species of gnat, which answers the purpose in some manner." — p. 217. 



Mr. Westwood describes the Blastophaga Sycomori of Gravenhorst, 

 and a new insect which he names Sycophaga crasslpes, both of these 

 he appears to consider the instruments of caprification, and suggests 

 that the remarkable Agaon paradoxum of Dalman may be an insect of 

 the same family, viz. the Chalcidida3 : he however very justly remarks 

 on the fruit-feeding habits of these little insects being so entirely dif- 

 ferent from what we know of the economy of the Chalcidida?. 



XLV. — Descriptions of two new Coleopterous Insects, from the Collection 

 of Sir Patrick Walker. By G. R. Waterhouse, Esq., Curator to 

 the Museum of the Zoological Society. 



The author in this paper has described two very interesting Ma- 

 crocerous Coleoptera. The first, which he has named Donjsthenes 

 Baladeva Walkeri, is closely allied to the Dorysthencs rostratus of 

 Vigors, synonymous with the Prionus rostratus of Fabiicius, ' Syst. 

 Eleu.' ii. 257, fine specimens of which extraordinary insect are in the 

 Banksian collection of the Linnean Society ; but Mr. Watcrhouse re- 

 marks that the new species may be distinguished by the absence of 



