PARASITIC INSECTS. 291 



prying, and destructive. They are specious in outward form, 

 but they are for ever watching opportunities to make breaches 

 in the citadel of life, that they may introduce therein, 

 sometimes a single assassin, sometimes a murderous host, 

 which sap its foundations, and bring it, sooner or later, to 

 destruction. 



Ichneumon is the name generally applied to the parasitic 

 race of which we have been speaking. There are, however, 

 various insects of parasitic habits which are not properly ich- 

 neumons, though the name, as signifying pryers, does not ill 

 befit them. 



The original ichneumon of antiquity was, as most people are 

 aware, no insect at all, but a little four-footed animal, a pryer 

 after, and devourer of, crocodiles' eggs, on which account 

 it was adorned by the deifying people of Egypt as among 

 their benefactors ; and amongst others, we are bound, cer- 

 tainly, to rank its insect namesakes, prying as they do, for our 

 benefit, after caterpillars in the egg as well as in maturity. 



But the extensive value of ichneumons, a check upon 

 caterpillar depredation, may be best estimated by their num- 

 bers, of which we may form a tolerable notion when we hear 

 of above 1300 species 1 in Europe only, some so minute "that 

 the egg of a butterfly is sufficient for the support of two 

 [individuals] until they reach maturity; others so large that 

 the body of a full-grown caterpillar does not more than suffice 

 for one." 2 



The ichneumons belong to the same order (that of Hy- 

 menoptera) as wasps and bees ; both, spite of their relation- 

 ship, among the objects of their treacherous attack. 



Of this distant kinship there are outward traces in the 

 four transparent wings, and in the slight wasp-like attachment 

 of ichneumon's breast and abdomen, also in its prevailing 

 colours of black and orange; but the ichneumon, whether 



1 " Naturalist's Library." * Kirby and Spence, Introduction. 



