1910] Girault and Sanders —Chalcidoid Parasites 157 
shells of the venter, but less so than is the case with Spalangia. In 
a few instances the hosts were mere fragments, but the great 
majority were as has been described. 
After emergence of the adult parasite, an examination of the host 
puparium reveals at first the shrunken and blackened remains of 
the host pupa lying in its natural position along the floor of the 
puparium and attached to it, usually along the dorsum of the caudal 
portions of the abdomen, the yellowish pupal cast of the parasite 
and then caudad of the host remains, lying upon the floor of the 
puparium, free, the peculiar, round-angled, dark meconium of the 
parasite larva; or the latter may be attached to the host remains as 
in Spalangia, there resembling a dark clot. As this meconium is 
characteristic, and can be readily distinguished from that of Spalan- 
gia, and hence forms an available means of identity when others are 
absent, by way of description it may be stated that, to the naked eye, 
it resembles a small solid, black-brown bead, about thrice the size 
of a visible grain of sand, resembling somewhat a coarse grain of 
powder, but not as irregular or as angular, measuring actually about 
.8 mm., its general outline convex and dome-shaped, the bottom flat, 
and the convex upper side, with a concavity, groove or impression 
along or in its center or at one end; this impression is quite often 
segmented, and as it is known that it is formed by the abdomen of 
the parasitic pupa which rests in it, the segmented appearance is 
due to the impression made in the then soft meconium by the in- 
cisions of the abdominal segments of the larva; the place of this 
groove is variable, and it may be absent, tending to show that the 
pupa of the parasite was not attached to it in the usual way; the 
edges of the impression are quite often acute or sharpened ridges; 
from above the meconium’s outline is circular, with some irregular 
angulation; rarely it is quite irregular. It is much smaller in 
diameter — at least by a half —than the meconium of Spalangia 
which is wider and flatter, lozenge- or discus-shaped, and hence the 
two are readily distinguished on comparison. So far as the evidence 
goes, the manner or nature of the parasitism does not differ for sex 
of the parasite nor for species of the host. However, in four 
authentic instances, instead of the puparium stadium being affected, 
it was the larval stadium. The hosts in these instances were Chrys- 
omyia macellaria and Phormia regina and the parasites emerged 
from single, nearly full-grown larve isolated in capsules. 
