ORDER VI. VEIN-WINGED INSECTS. 245 



Figure 69. 



The Pigeon Tremex. 



ily of them, is provided with a borer, which is one inch 

 long, as thick as a bristle, of a black color, and always con- 

 cealed within the body when not in use. Elm-trees and 

 button-wood are their favorite points of attack, into the 

 trunks of which they bore holes half an inch deep and 

 drop their eggs therein. In performing this operation they 

 not unfrequently become victims of their zeal and labor, 

 driving in their borer so tightly that they are not able to 

 extract it, in consequence of which they are fastened to the 

 spot and perish by starvation. Their eggs are oblong, and 

 the larva?, or grubs, proceeding from them are in turn often 

 stung by the long piercer of the Pimpla, who smuggles her 

 cuckoo egg into the hole upon that of the Tremex, and in 

 so doing also loses her life very often, by being in like man- 

 ner fastened to the trunk of the tree. 



The larvae of the wood-wasp are yellow, somewhat re- 

 sembling the grubs of the May-beetle, and are often found 

 in blocks of wood at the shops of carpenters. They feed 

 exclusively on wood, making long passages through it, and 

 thus destroying much valuable timber ; and as they grow 



