INSECTS. 



Family PROCTOTRYPIB^E. 



The members of this obscure family are minute insects, with scarcely a trace of 

 nervures in the wings in some species ; and the ovipositor can be protruded and 



withdrawn at pleasure. Though some of the 

 species are wholly unlike the Aculeata, yet others 

 approach them so nearly in general characters that 

 the present classification must be regarded as 

 tentative. The habits of these minute insects are 

 imperfectly known, though some are parasitic in 

 the eggs of insects and spiders. The perfect insects, 

 small and black, with variously-shaped plumose 

 wings, seem to prefer damp, dark localities, such as 

 furnished beneath fallen leaves and debris of 

 hedges. Here also may be placed the two species 

 of egg- wasps (Teleas hvviusculus and T. terebrans), 

 which are both shining black and very minute 

 insects, shown in the accompanying illustration, 

 where they are buzzing round the eggs of a moth, 

 ready to insert their own. The females usually 

 deposit their eggs in those of the family Bombycidce, 

 as, for instance, those of the common lackey. 



Familv GhalcibiBjE. 



1, 



EGG-WASPS. 



Teleas Icevlusculus ; 2, Teleas tere- 

 brans ; 3, Eggs of a moth with a Teleas 

 upon them about to pierce and lay its 

 eggs within ; 4, Eggs. (All but No. 

 4 much enlarged.) 



This group includes a large number of small 

 brightly - coloured insects with metallic lustre ; 

 nearly three thousand European species being 

 known, while the tropics have not yet furnished 

 their contingent of species. The antennae are 

 always elbowed, and the wings broad with few nervures. Some of the larvae 

 live in galls, devouring the grub of the gall-wasp or those of the other inhabitants 

 of the galls. The members of the present order, scale-insects and plant-lice, are 

 alike subject to the attacks of the species of this family. One species {Leucopsis 

 gigas) found in Southern Europe lays its eggs in the larvae of a mason-bee, which 

 makes a cell of hard cement to protect its grub. Now the attacker has a boring 

 apparatus, and the problem is how to ascertain the whereabouts of a grub, bore 

 through the hard masonry, and lay eggs in the inmate. The cells are not distinct ; 

 but the whole number, which are made in a sort of colony, are covered with 

 cement, so that the task is doubly difficult. With the divining powers apparently 

 situate in the antennae, a suitable spot is chosen, and after, it may be, an hour or so 

 of continuous boring, the succulent morsel is reached and the egg laid. How the 

 wasp knows where the grub lies is not known. It seems to have the power — if not 

 of seeing — at any rate of feeling literally through a brick wall. One of the largest 

 members of the family is the gouty-legged wasp (Smicra clavipes), the egg 

 of which is laid in the larvae of certain water-insects. The wasp is glistening 



