August — December 1SS9. 



PSYCHE. 



235 



Calandridae. 



Calandra remotepunctata Gyll. 

 Cossonus platalea Say. 



SCOLYTIDAE. 



Pityophthorus puUus Zimm. 



Coccotrypes jalappae Letz. Detroit. 



[Schvvarz.] 

 Tomicus calligraphus Germ. Pine 



regions. [Cook.] 

 Dendroctonus terebrans Oliv. Pine 



regions. [Cook.] 



A SHORT CHAPTER IN 



THE HISTORY 

 GALL-FLIES. 



OF THE CYNIPIDOUS 



BY HOMER FRANKLIX BASSETT, WATERBURV, CT. 



It was reasonable to suppose that when 

 that most interesting field of research into 

 the life history of the gall insects that re- 

 lates to their agamic reproduction had 

 been opened, some one or more of our 

 young entomologists would have en- 

 tered upon the investigations that were 

 necessary, and long ago, have done for 

 our American what the German and 

 French entomologists have done for the 

 European species. 



The writer, who so long ago as 1S64, 

 published the first clue to the solution 

 of the mystery of agamic reproduction 

 in the family of the cvnipidae., has, un- 

 fortiuiately, grown old without finding 

 the leisure to follow, very far, the fasci- 

 nating field for discovery that then ap- 

 peared before him. 



I have, since then, done some frag- 

 mentary work in the way of describing 

 new species, and some work that I do 

 not yet despair of giving to the world in 

 the shape of a monograph of the cyni- 



pidae., but the limited leisure I have 

 had and the uncertainty of being able to 

 follow to results, an}- investigations or 

 observations that demanded attention at 

 a definite time and place, has debarred 

 me from following what I still think, 

 one of the most interesting and impor- 

 tant branches of entomological study. 



I have gathered a few facts, however, 

 and I beg to lay before the readers of 

 Psyche an account of a discovery I 

 made this last spring, partly in the hope 

 that it may lead some one to go fiu'ther 

 in the same line, — but chiefly, because 

 ever}' discovery in science belongs to the 

 world just as soon as its validity is estab- 

 lished. 



One of our most common gall insects 

 here in Connecticut is Callirhytis f uti- 

 lise, O. S. The galls appear in early 

 summer, in great numbers on the leaves 

 oi ^uercus alba. They are in the form 

 of conical blotches, projecting from both 

 surfaces of the leaf, but are more prom- 



