AND IMPORTANCE. 229 



from them; and neither bulk, courage, nor ferocity 

 avail to terrify them from effecting their purpose." * 



"An idea of the services rendered to us by those 

 ichneumons which prey upon noxious larvee may be 

 formed from the fact, that out of thirty individuals of 

 the common cabbage caterpillar {Pupilio brassiae) 

 which Reaumur put into a glass to feed, twenty-five 

 were fatally pierced by an ichneumon (/. globatus) ; 

 and if we compare the myriads of caterpillars that 

 often attack our cabbages and brocoli with the small 

 number of butterflies of this species which usually 

 appear, we may conjecture that they are commonly 

 destroyed in some such proportion, — a circumstance 

 which will lead us thankfully to acknowledge the 

 goodness of Providence, which, by providing such 

 a check, has prevented the utter destruction of the 

 Brassica genus, including some of our most esteemed 

 and useful vegetables." f 



As these insects are so widely diffused, you will 

 have ".0 difficulty in obtaining specimens of various 

 genera, and you will see at once that they belong 

 to the same order as the bees, the wasps, and the 

 ants, already described — the Hymenoptera. It is a 

 remarkable fact, however, that these parasites, whose 

 universal office it is in their first state of being to 

 prey upon insects, are themselves liable to be preyed 



* Kirby and Spence, p. 264. t lb. vol. i. p. 266. 



