46 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



In April of the following year I took out some of the 

 cocoons ; most of them had the appearance of fig. 9, some, 

 however, being narrower: all v;ere closely beset with grains 

 of earth on the outside. 1 was not a little surprised to find 

 all the cocoons filled with a mould, having the appearance of 

 wadding, and so entirely filling the interior that even the 

 horny head of the larva could not be recognized. I con- 

 cluded from this that 1 had kept the earth too damp instead 

 of too dry, as had usually been the case, and in consequence 

 of which I had often found the larvae dried up in their 

 cocoons. 



As my attempts at rearing would not succeed, I deter- 

 mined, if possible, to watch the act of oviposition. For this 

 purpose I visited my elder-bush once or twice every day 

 iaefore noon ; in clear weather three times ; and again 

 between two and four o'clock : this was the same bush which 

 had produced so many larvae the year before. On one of the 

 first days of May I observed a savvfly on one of the leaves ; 

 it looked to me like Macrophya Rapae : unfortunately the 

 next moment it was driven away by an Ichneumon. On the 

 7th of May I again found some young larvae on the same 

 bush (from which I concluded that the sawfly I had seen 

 had deposited some eggs), and, together with these very 

 young larvas, some empty egg-cases at the tips of the leaves, 

 which were growing at the lowest part of the bush. I need 

 hardly add that the larvae and the egg-cases occurred on the 

 same leaves. The larvae, although very small, strongly 

 resembled our fig. 1. At fig. 10a are represented the empty 

 egg-cases of the actual size ; at h are two cases side by side, 

 magnified ; the irregular openings can easily be seen, by 

 which the little larvae had made their escape. 



It thus appeared that the complete observation of the 

 metamorphoses of our insect would again have to be deferred 

 to the following spring. I was obliged to content myself 

 with checking my notes of the appearance and habits of the 

 larvae. In the year 1866, however, the continued daily 

 observation of the elder-bush, which I had recommenced in 

 April, led to a discovery. At half- past eleven on the morning 

 of the 8th of that month I observed a lemale of M. albi- 

 cincta, Schr.^ flying about the bush in a very wild manner, 

 and settling at intervals on the leaves; the temperature was 



