168 OUR HOUSEHOLD INSECTS 



earwig passed along his boards, and in two days removed 

 the antennae from thirty-six moths all belonging to one 

 species, while examples of other species were left un- 

 touched. The entomologist who hunts for moths at 

 night by smearing the syrupy liquid, technically called 

 "sugar," on the trunks of trees, as a bait, often finds, on 

 revisiting his trap, that crowds of earwigs have found 

 out the store, and are revelling in the tempting sweets. 



Notwithstanding their retiring habits, earwigs do not 

 escape the attacks of parasites. Westwood states that 

 there is\ a kind of ichneumon-fly which attacks the 

 common earwig, depositing eggs in its body, the con- 

 tents of which are devoured by the larvse hatched from 

 them ; and I have myself found a large fleshy maggot, 

 apparently that of a flesh-eating Dipterous fly, inside the 

 body of a full-grown earwig. Internal insect parasites, 

 such as these, whether Hymenopterous, like the ichneu- 

 mon-fly, or Dipterous, like the maggot above referred to, 

 when attacking insects which pass through a complete 

 metamorphosis, usually become mature while their host 

 is in the chrysalis condition, and thus the latter does 

 not itself reach maturity, but perishes while still a 

 chrysalis through the development and exit of the 

 parasite. Here the very fact of the host's being in a 

 quiescent condition, and taking no food, is the means 

 of sounding its own death-knell, the parasite absorbing 

 its vital tissues, while it has no power of repair. The 

 parasite is complete master of the situation, and, in 

 consequence, it is the rarest thing imaginable for the 

 host to struggle on to maturity. But with such an 

 insect as the earwig, the case is different. Here we- 

 have an insect which has no quiescent pupa stage, but 

 continues to take food throughout life, thereby to some 

 extent perpetually neutralising the effect of the parasite's 



