76 Miscellaneous . 



larva of Ocyptera bicolor in Pentatoma grisea *. As regards the 

 species of Carabus, Boj-e, in the year 1838, reared Tachina- from 

 Carahus violaceus, cancellatus, and clathratus f. The description of 

 this fly under the name of Tachina pcicia is to be found in Zetter- 

 stedtj. 



Since that time, so far as I kno-^', no Tacluna-\ax\^ have been 

 found in species of Carabus. The species Tachina pacta is very 

 little known and very doubtful. Our Russian dipterologist, J. A. 

 Portschinsky, to whom I am indebted for many references to lite- 

 rature, is of opinion that Tachina pacta is identical with Tachina 

 (Masicera) cinerea. Zetterstedt himself says of Tachina p>acta that 

 it is '•' valde similis et affinis Tachince cinerece." Schiner is of the 

 same opinion. 



As regards the mode of penetration of the larva into the body of 

 the Carahus, we must, in all probability, consider that the fly de- 

 l)Osits its egg in the stigma, and the larva, escaping from the egg, 

 bores through the wall of the trachea and gradually extends its body 

 into the body-cavity of the beetle. During this time there are 

 formed around the larva, on the part of the hypodermal layer of the 

 trachea, chitinous deposits, which are strongest in the vicinity of 

 the abdominal wall at the hinder extremity of the larva, and here 

 form a brown cup, the margin of which, however, passes without 

 any sharp boundary into the translucent chitinous lobes which sur- 

 round the rest of the body of the larva. 



^ A little while ago, Jules Xiinckel d'Herculais described a parasitic 

 fly {Gi/rnnosoma rotumlatuin), the larva of which lives in the body 

 of Pentatoma §. In this case also the larva has its hinder extremity 

 turned towards the stigma, aad this end is embraced by a chitinous 

 cup, called by Kiinckel " le siphon." Kiiuekel, however, thinks that 

 " le siphon " is a secretion of the larva itself, and by no means a pro- 

 duct of the hypoderm of the infested insect. Kiinckel also describes 

 the mode of penetration into the body in a different fashion, namely, 

 that the fly sticks its eggs to the ventral segments of the Pentatoma, 

 and the escaping larva penetrates between the ventral segments 

 into the abdominal cavity and only by degrees becomes connected 

 with the stigma. However this may be with regard to the Penta- 

 toma and Gijmnosoma rotundatum, in Carabus the case is most 

 probably as I have suggested. The penetration of the larva through 

 the stigma is in this instance evidenced by the fact that even the 

 very smallest larvie are attached to the stigma, and that they are 

 onlv met with on the stigma. — Zooloyischer Anzeiyer, no. 1G9, June 9. 

 1884, p. 316. 



* Ann. Sci. Nat. tome x. p. 248. 



t 'Ivroyer's Natm-historisk Tidsskrift,' 1838. See also Erichson's 

 ' Bericht iiber die wiss. Leistuugen im Gebiete der Eutomologie im Jahre 

 183s; BerUn, 1840, p. 93. 



X ' Diptera Scaudinavite,' tome iii. pp. 1038-1039. 



§ Aim. Soc. Ent. Fr. ser. 5, tome ix. (1879). 



