50 APPENDIX. 



fill, for they arc eaten alive bit by bit IJy an extraordinary ap- 

 pointment, the unnatural parasite begins, as soon as his strength 

 permits, to devour its living foster parent, and desists not till he is 

 quite consumed. The ichneumon mother is not nice in her choice, 

 but settles her progeny impartially upon friend or foe; every insect 

 is liable to this prima facie cruel dispensation. The largest cater- 

 pillar, the strongest larva, cannot elude the fatal depositum, and will 

 assuredly be turned inside out, by the nascent traitor. The mother 

 ichneumon, they moreover tell us, always fixes upon an insect just 

 adequate in size to the future wants of her family, and whose skin is 

 not too tough for the unborn young to eat their way through : what 

 discernment ! Sometimes they inoculate their own eggs into a but- 

 terfly's, and the young comes forth an ichneumon. They will watch 

 a nest which another insect has just made, and while its proprietor 

 (fearful of some danger of the kind, for has not she too, her in- 

 stincts^ is gone in quest of materials to cover the aperture, they 

 have already taken their opportunity, and when she returns with 

 her mortar, it is too late ! If they cannot gain direct admittance, 

 they are satisfied with leaving the eggs of their mischief which, of 

 course, they know will be duly hatched afterwards, taking care to 

 push them in as far as they can, and trusting the rest to the sagacity 

 of the future larva itself! The hopeful progeny not only never fail 

 to accomplish what is expected from them, but show good taste 

 almost as soon as they are born ! for instead of eating up any part 

 of their fosler-pareni that comes nearest, they begin with his fat, and 

 it is only when they have attained a certain size, and are become 

 lusty on their infantile diet, that they begin to tear him piecemeal 

 and prey upon his vitals ! 



LES CARABIQUES. 



This family is immense ! the collector who would have speci- 

 mens of most of the genera which it contains, will find no difficulty 

 in filling a dozen boxes out of 100 in a general collection of Coleop- 

 teres : all are remarkable for carnivorous propensities, and most 

 of them being very active and swift, carry on a successful war of 

 extermination against all other insects. One of the many proofs of 

 their cunning, in procuring a dinner without trouble, may be 



