eggs of Hemiptera. 195 



— 1, that the bug is of a carnivorous nature (belonging, 

 doubtless, to the Ileduvmla, though the species is not 

 known) ; 2, that the newly-hatched bugs are mere 

 skeletons, apparently almost all external organisation, 

 with the abdomen destitute of any contents, so that 

 they would be urgently in need of a supply of food ; and 

 B, the fact that the wasp has a slit made on the back of 

 its thorax, so that the young bugs could plunge their 

 rostra without any difficulty into the interior of the 

 wasp. 



The Eeduviid bugs have some of them the power of 

 inflicting a wound that has a very numbing effect. It 

 might well be, then, that the wasp was mastered by the 

 parent bug, who split the wasp's thorax with its rostrum, 

 benumbed it by the same process, and then attached it 

 to the egg-mass as a store of food to start the newly- 

 hatched young bugs on their journey through life. This, 

 however, is purely supposition, though I hope it may be 

 some day confirmed by the observation of a naturalist 

 who shall be so happy as to have the opportunity of 

 watching the habits of Reduviid bugs in the Amazon 

 Valley. 



But the cliief interest in these bugs' eggs is connected 

 with the peculiar capsule and its contained cone, and we 

 cannot but ask what can be the function of this beautiful 

 and complex structure. The answer that would be 

 given by those who are acquainted with Leuckart's paper 

 "On the Micropyle, and the minute structure of the 

 Egg-shell in Insect's Eggs" (Miiller's Arch. f. Anat. 

 Phys., 1855), would be that it is a micropyle-apparatus 

 of the most complex and perfect character ; and on the 

 whole I am inclined to believe that this solution, extra- 

 ordinary as it may seem to be, is likely to prove, at any 

 rate, partially correct ; but it must be admitted that 

 there is considerable doubt about it, and that some other 

 purpose is also served by the structure. 



A micropyle is a canal through an egg-shell, by 

 which the entry of a spermatozoon to the egg is facili- 

 tated ; nothing can be simpler than that arrangement, 

 and one does not see any reason why it should be de- 

 parted from to give place to an extraordinarily large and 

 complex apparatus that the spermatozoon must traverse 

 before arriving at its destination. The capsule and the 

 cone contained in it are no doubt fabricated in the 



