166 THE ENYOMOLOGIST. 
The pseudo-chrysalis of Sitaris Colletes exhibits this interior 
metamorphosis —as seen through the semi-transparent 
corneous tegument-—after about ten weeks, towards the end 
of July or the middle of August; the perfect beetle emerging 
usually the following month ; although in some rare instances 
—attributable, as M. Valéry Mayet conceives, to insufficient 
nutriment in the primitive stage, when the Colletes-egg has 
been partially tapped by other competitors—the ultimate 
metamorphosis is protracted until the autumn of the following 
year. In Sitaris humeralis, however, such retardation is the 
general rule; it being only in exceptional cases that some of 
these remain scarcely more than a single mouth in the 
pseudo-chrysalis state, completing their metamorphoses in 
August, and emerging shortly after. But they usually 
hybernate in the former stage; and it is only in June of the 
second year that the interior quasi-larval form is separated 
from the pseudo-puparium, and about five weeks later 
becomes transformed to a true pupa-nymph; the same 
month, in fact, when the. adult larva had assumed its 
corneous tegument in the previous year (Fabre, l.c., pp. 
339—343). M. Valéry Mayet recognises this pupa as “la 
vérilable nymphe” (p.75); therefore the antecedent stage, or 
“troisieéme larve” of Fabre, and not his “ pseudo-chrysalide,” 
can alone constitute the pseudo-pupa or “ pseudo-nymphe.” 
Thus the Sitaris humeralis usually requires two years to 
complete its metamorphoses, hybernating the first year in the 
primitive larval condition, and the second in that of the 
pseudo-chrysalis; whereas the Sitaris Colletes, commencing 
its operations seven months earlier, generally attains maturity 
within a single year. The early transformations of two other 
species of Meloidz have also been investigated by M. Jules 
Lichtenstein, of Montpellier, who succeeded in nurturing one 
of the primitive larva of Meloé cicatricosus on the egg of a 
Vespa vulgaris placed upon honey in a glass tube, and in 
witnessing its first metamorphosis five days later, when it 
plunged into the honey, but died after feeding thereon twelve 
days. This secondary form differed essentially from that of 
Meloé, described and figured by Fabre, apparently constituting 
an intermediate stage, closely resembling the antecedent 
larva, but destitute of caudal sete, with lacteous head and 
black eyes (the subsequent stage being blind), looking like a 
