130 HISTORY OF 



its own young, which the wasp had laboriously 

 built for a dearer posterity. 



Though there are many different kinds of this 

 insect, yet the most formidable, and that best 

 known, is called the Common Ichneumon, with 

 four wings, like the bee, a long slender black 

 body, and a three-forked tail, consisting of bris- 

 tles, the two outermost black, and the middlemost 

 red. This fly receives its name from the little 

 quadruped which is found to be so destructive to 

 the crocodile, as it bears a strong similitude in its 

 courage and rapacity. 



Though this instrument is to all appearance 

 slender and feeble, yet it is found to be a weapon 

 of great force and efficacy. There is scarcely any 

 substance which it will not pierce, and indeed it 

 is seldom seen but employed in penetration. This 

 is the weapon of defence ; this is employed in 

 destroying its prey ; and, still more, by this the 

 animal deposits her eggs wherever she thinks fit 

 to lay them. As it is an instrument chiefly em- 

 ployed for this purpose, the male is unprovided 

 with such a sting, while the female uses it with 

 great force and dexterity, brandishing it when 

 caught from side to side, and very often wound- 

 ing those who thought they held her with the 

 greatest security. 



All the flies of this tribe are produced in the 

 same manner, and owe their birth to the destruc- 

 tion of some other insect, within whose body they 

 have been deposited, and upon whose vitals they 

 have preyed, till they came to maturity. There 

 is no insect whatever which they will not attack, 



